Memories Of Harmony
by Knights-Honour
Summary: “Meeting you was fate. Becoming your friend was a choice. But falling in love with you I had no control over.” Please R'n'R! CHAP 4 UP.
1. Chapter 1

**Title: **Memories Of Harmony

**Author:** Knights-Honour

**Disclaimer: **"Harry Potter" and related characters © JKR

Rebecca Knight, Pan and Athena and every other character that you haven't heard of © Me; Natasha Maxwell.

**Author's Note:**

Thanks go to my Beta; Blueglaceon, for doing such a wonderful job editing this fic and suggesting some _brilliant_ lines.

Thanks go to Misti, or miscard on Portkey.

Listening to her wonderful Harry/Hermione podcast; Harmony Podcast, encouraged me to write my first Harry Potter fic. To all my fellow Harmonians who are reading this and have an I-Pod and/or I-Tunes; go and check the podcast out. Trust me, it is **well** worth your time.

And last but not least, I need to thank MissAnnThropic, who has allowed me to borrow ideas and exerts from her brilliant story _Vox Corporis_.

Now, on with the story...

**Chapter 1**

"I can't believe that it's been six years since we finished school!" Harry exclaimed as he and Hermione travelled, arm in arm, through the ancient hallways of Hogwarts on their way to the Great Hall to attend the Halloween Masquerade Ball.

At his words, Hermione looked at Harry with an eyebrow raised, which caused him to quickly add, "Well, six for me, five for you."

Hermione smiled before responding, "I suppose time would seem to fly by when you don't have to constantly look over your shoulder for a certain dark tyrant who's on your tail like a Dragon-hound,"

Harry chuckled at that. The years since Voldemort's defeat had indeed flown by for him.

When the Horcrux hunt had come to an end, he, Ron and Neville had presented themselves to the new Minister for Magic; Kingsley Shacklebolt, to express their interest in becoming Aurors. With all that they'd just accomplished, Shacklebolt had accepted them into the training program without any N.E.W.T.s.

"_Of course they'd let _you_ in," Ron had jibed to Harry later that afternoon as they'd settled into their quarters. "You're The-Man-Who-Vanquished-Voldemort after all."_

_Harry just rolled his eyes at the latest title that the wizarding world had bestowed upon him._

For her part, Hermione had chosen to return to Hogwarts to complete her education, which had come as no surprise to the two boys, nor to those of her surrogate year when she had appeared on Platform 9¾ on the first of September, packed and ready for the year ahead.

Harry was brought from his musings by a call of; "Hermione!"

Beside him, Hermione brightened as she caught sight of a copper-haired, green-eyed young woman dressed as an Amazon archer. "Becca!"

Letting go of Harry's arm, Hermione dashed forward to greet her friend with a hug. "It's wonderful to see you!" she exclaimed.

When the two drew apart, Hermione turned to Harry. "Harry, you remember Becca?"

Harry held out a hand to Rebecca. "That, I do."

Rebecca shook his offered hand, smiling warmly as she did so. "Good to see you too, Harry."

Letting go of Harry's hand, Rebecca took a step back to study the couple's costumes.

As she did, Hermione recalled the day that the two of them had met.

_Hermione stood, unmoving, on the platform, observing all of the activity that was going on around her; mothers hugging their children, fathers loading trunks onto the Hogwarts Express, kids talking animatedly to each other about what they'd each been up to over the holidays and the squawks and squalor of familiars in their cages._

_But even with all of the hullabaloo going on, there was something else that Hermione could feel. _

_Tranquillity. _

_Voldemort's defeat had lifted the veil of fear that had covered the entire wizarding world, allowing peace to return to its rightful place._

_And it was all thanks to Harry. _

_Hermione was suddenly pulled from her thoughts as something big and furry bustled past her back, knocking her over in the process. Miffed, Hermione got to her feet and turned, intent on giving the offender a lecture. But when she spotted the wrongdoer, she froze, her words dying in her throat._

_There before her, greedily snapping up a mouse that it had caught, was a griffin._

_As her mind processed that fact, it also realised something else; this griffin's looks differed from the creature's typical appearance. Instead of the famous eagle/lion hybrid, the beast before her was a barn owl/mountain lion cross. As Hermione took in the beast's majestic form, it finished its meal and fixed its amber gaze on her._

_The two of them were brought out of their reverie when a scolding voice spoke up from behind Hermione. "_Pan!_"_

_Hermione turned as a young woman approached them, her concern for Hermione evident in her eyes. "Are you alright?"_

"_I'm fine."_

"_My apologies about my familiar. Once he spots something he can hunt, he doesn't see _anything_ else."_

_Hermione smiled. "We can all be like that from time to time."_

_At this the young woman chuckled."Name's Rebecca Knight."_

"_Hermione Granger."_

_Hermione's eyes returned to Pan. "How did you g-Wait a moment! Did you just say your _familiar_?"_

_Rebecca grinned at Hermione's reaction. "I did."_

_A look of pure awe washed over Hermione's face. "Oh... wow... I read about this... About a witch or wizard asking a magical beast to become their familiar..."_

_Rebecca laughed, and upon seeing the questions swimming in the elder girl's eyes, she began to speak, stroking Pan's head as she did so, "Pan was injured when my father found him. He brought him home and nursed him back to health, intending on releasing him once he was fully recuperated. Only thing Dad didn't count on was Pan and I bonding. Once Pan was better I asked him if he wanted to become my familiar. He said yes, and here we are."_

_At the end of Rebecca's speech, Pan turned his head and gently nibbled on his mistress' palm._

_Hermione could only shake her head, the expression of awe still on her features. Dumbledore had been the only one that she'd known of that had accomplished this particular feat. _

_But as she marvelled on that fact, her logical voice whispered something in her mind, and she spoke it aloud, "You're not taking him back-"_

"_To Hogwarts? No. After all: '_Students may bring, if they desire, either an owl, a cat or a toad_'," she grinningly quoted the Hogwarts invitation letter. "He comes with us to see me off and then my father takes him home."_

_At this, Pan clicked his beak, and Hermione looked to him. The griffin clearly abhorred the idea of parting ways with Rebecca._

"_I know how you feel," Hermione said softly to Pan. "I was separated from my familiar for the majority of last year."_

_Even though things had been hectic during the Horcrux hunt, there had been times when she had really missed her half-Kneazle companion's company. But she had been reunited with Crookshanks after the Battle of Hogwarts, and had learned that the Weasleys had been taking care of him since the trio had fled from the Burrow after the Death Eaters' attack on Bill and Fluer's wedding._

_But she also knew that her suffering during that time paled in comparison to Harry's. She and Ron had only been separated from their familiars, Harry had lost his completely. _

_Hermione was brought from her thoughts when Rebecca spoke again, "It's not too bad. He comes to see me on our Hogsmeade visits," Rebecca looked to her watch, "Shoot! Is _that_ the time! Come on Pan, we better get back to Dad. Nice to meet you Hermione."_

"_Likewise."_

_With a nod of her head, Rebecca turned and headed back along the platform with Pan trotting at her side._

Hermione was pulled back into the present by Rebecca's questioning voice, "Harry's a no brainer: a knight. But you, 'Mione... Shakespeare?"

"_Hermione_ from _The Winter's Tale__," Hermione confirmed._

_Rebecca laughed, "Trust you to dress as your name-sake. Anyway, I'd best head back inside and make sure that Pan's not eaten the place clean."_

_At this, both Harry and Hermione laughed before they followed her into the Great Hall, taking in the familiar Halloween decorations as they went._

"About time you two showed up!" Ron called out to them when he saw them.

Ron was dressed as one of his favourite Chudley Cannon Quidditch players whilst his date, Luna, appeared to be a breathtakingly beautiful wood Nymph.

"Some of us aren't lucky enough to be on injury leave," Harry called back.

Ron laughed at that. "I suppose your right."

With a grin Harry began to catch up with their friends.

As Hermione watched him, her own thoughts drifted to all that had happened over the past five years, starting with her last year at Hogwarts. She'd been happy to be back in the ancient walls again after all that had gone on the year before, back in her element of academic pursuits. But the one thing she hadn't counted on was just how much she'd missed not having Harry and Ron by her side.

Ever since that fateful day twelve years ago, it had always been the three of them, side by side, through thick and thin.

"_I know how you're feeling," Rebecca told Hermione as they prepared for bed that night._

_Hermione looked up from the photo she was holding of herself, Harry and Ron taken during their first year. "What do you mean?"_

"_Being separated from your friends."_

"_You mean Pan?"_

_Rebecca shook her head before gesturing to the empty bed on her right. "One of my closest friends used to sleep there. Her name was Talia."_

"_What happened?"_

"_When V-Voldemort declared war, Talia and her parents fled the country. When I returned to Hogwarts, I knew, even from the first night, that things were going to be different. And I was right, I'd never felt more alone. I missed everything about her, including the things that I would normally find annoying." Rebecca's face turned wistful. "She loved Quidditch, would talk about it for hours on end."_

_Hermione chuckled in a knowing manner._

"_I think the only time that we were able to have a really good discussion about the same subject was after seeing Harry going head to head in the air against that Horntail after it snapped its chain during the First Task. I remember that we talked for hours after it was complete, finally understanding and appreciating each other's love. Her about how awesome the Horntail was and me about how Harry's Quidditch skills had helped him survive a face-off with _the_ most dangerous breed of dragon alive."_

_Hermione smiled at Rebecca's impassioned words about the Horntail. "I take it that you want to become a Magizoologist once you leave Hogwarts?"_

_Rebecca nodded her head before continuing, "And as for Pan," as she spoke she extracted a box from her trunk. Opening it she took out a figurine of her familiar and tapping it with her wand, she spoke, _"Rennervate." _The figurine immediately sprang to life and took to the wing, soaring around the room once before perching on Rebecca's bedside table and curling up. "I got the idea after seeing Harry's Horntail figurine," she explained. "But I have to warn you, he can be a bit of a pest in the morning."_

After that night, she and Rebecca had become fast friends.

But while some parts of her life had thrived, others had not. Her relationship with Ron for example.

They had given it their best shot to make it work, but it clearly wasn't meant to be. They had stopped bickering when they'd initially gotten together and were happy for a time. But after a while their personalities had begun to clash again and more often than not, their confrontations had left her in tears.

So she'd made the decision to end it.

Then something had happened that she hadn't expected.

_A letter had arrived from Harry via owl post that morning and Hermione was currently making her way around the Black Lake, reading the letter as she went. She smiled, feeling proud of Harry as he described their current lot of training and how the three boys were faring with it. _

_A warmth enveloped her as she read the end of his letter:_

'I miss you like crazy.

Love from,

Harry._'_

_As she read and re-read his words, she felt her heart-rate speed up._

_He usually ended his letters with:_

'Keep safe,

Harry.'

_And just like that, she realized, the crush she that she'd had on him since fifth year had never truly gone away, though she'd done her best to bury it when Harry had started showing interest in other girls, telling herself that he could never be interested in her like that. And, as an image of Harry's face during his last year at Hogwarts shimmered to life in her mind, she made a decision to tell him about how she felt about him._

Her chance had come, quite unexpectedly, a few weeks later.

_It was Halloween and everyone was excited about the upcoming Hogsmeade visit and the Halloween Feast afterwards._

But then the school had learned that Amycus and Alecto Carrow had somehow managed to escape authority and were on the loose.

Everyone had been, understandably, unnerved.

For a few days, Professor McGonagall, the new Headmistress of Hogwarts, had considered cancelling the upcoming visit in order to keep her students safe, but when she had learned that several Aurors had been posted at the village she had allowed the trip to go ahead.

"_Come on, Hermione," Rebecca called up the staircase. "Pan's probably there by now!"_

_Hermione could only smile at her friend's impatience, though she knew that it was understandable. "I'm coming!"_

"_So's Christmas!"_

_Laughing, Hermione grabbed her beanie and scarf and headed down the stairs to the common room, where her friend was waiting for her._

– – o – – o – –

_Harry made his way into the kitchen. "Morning, Neville."_

"_Morning, Harry."_

"_Ron on patrol?"_

_Neville nodded in response as his mouth was full of scrambled eggs._

"_Any sign?"_

_Neville shook his head and Harry let out an agitated breath as he turned to get himself some breakfast, becoming wrapped up in his sombre thoughts as he worked._

"_There is a bit of good news though," Neville's voice returned Harry to the present._

"_Yeah?"_

"_Hogsmeade visit today," Neville said simply._

_Harry could only smile._

– – o – – o – –

_Half an hour later found the two girls trudging through the snow on their way into the village, Rebecca scanning the landscape for her familiar as she went. Hermione began to do the same, but when her eyes fell on a figure that had just come out of the Three Broomsticks she stopped still, a grin appearing on her face. "Harry!"_

_Harry stopped and turned as he heard Hermione call out to him, and could only grin in return as he saw her dashing towards him. _

_Meeting each other with a hug, he greeted her softly, "Hey 'Mione."_

_Behind them, a _thump_ of something hitting the ground was heard, and the two drew apart to look at the cause; Pan had pounced on Rebecca. Hermione could only laugh at the proud expression on Pan's face. As Pan hopped off his mistress and Rebecca got to her feet, Hermione turned to Harry. "Harry, I'd like you to meet Rebecca Knight and her familiar, Pan. Becca, Pan, this is Harry."_

_Harry could only blink, stunned, as he processed what Hermione had said, and when he found his voice, he responded, "_Familiar_?"_

_All Rebecca could do was laugh at the all too common reaction to Pan's introduction. _

_When she'd calmed down she nodded her head in greeting. "It's a pleasure to meet you Harry. There's hardly a sentence that comes out of Hermione's mouth that doesn't have your name in it."_

_At this, Harry quirked an eyebrow at Hermione and she blushed furiously in response before looking away. When she'd regained her composure, Hermione looked back to her raven-haired best friend. "What are you doing here?"_

"_You hear about the Carrows?" he questioned._

_Hermione nodded. "It didn't go down too well at school."_

"_I'll just bet it didn't," Harry replied grimly. "Shacklebolt posted us here, hoping that my presence would draw them out."_

"_Us?"_

"_Me, Neville and Ron."_

"_Neville, Ron, and _I,_ Harry," Hermione corrected him._

_Harry chuckled at that. '_Some things never change.'

_But their cheery chat was suddenly interrupted when Ron stomped up to where they were standing, grabbed Hermione's arm and steered her back into the Three Broomsticks. As the door shut behind them, Harry heard Hermione exclaim, "Ronald Weasley, what's gotten into you?"_

_Beside him, Harry heard Pan click his beak, affronted at Ron's treatment of Hermione. Rebecca seemed to share her companion's opinion, shaking her head in disgust before she turned to look at Harry. "It's been nice to meet you Harry, but if you'll excuse me, I've got some errands to attend to," she told him before heading towards Honeydukes, Pan trudging right behind her._

_Letting out a sigh, Harry continued on with his patrol._

_Half an hour later found Harry on the outskirts of Hogsmeade, his eyes ever sharp for the Carrows as he went about his rounds. Suddenly a noise came from behind him and he spun around, wand at the ready. He relaxed, however, when he saw that it was only Neville's lion Patronus, and he lowered his wand as it spoke, "Harry, come quickly!" _

_Without another word, the Patronus turned and bounded off, Harry hot on its tail. He followed it until Neville came into view in front of the Three Broomsticks._

"_Neville! What's happened?" Harry asked as he came to skidding stop._

"_It's not the Carrows," Neville told him immediately. "It's Hermione. She ran past me a few minutes ago, really upset."_

_Harry frowned. "What about Ron?"_

_Just then, Ron appeared in the doorway, but when he caught sight of Harry, his face darkened and he strode forward._

"_Ron?" Harry questioned as Ron stormed passed them, knocking Harry over in the process._

"_Piss off," Ron responded harshly._

'What's gotten into him?_' Harry thought furiously as he got to his feet and brushed the snow off of his cloak._

"_Should I follow him to make sure that he doesn't Disapparate?" Neville queried Harry._

"_No, he'll be alright. He just needs time to cool down," Harry told him. "Can you take over my patrol while I go and find Hermione?"_

"_I got it covered. She went that way," Neville pointed southwards. "I thought I saw her go into a bookstore."_

"_Thanks Neville. Patronus me if you see anything," Harry called over his shoulder as he turned and headed in the mentioned direction._

_He found Hermione tucked away in a dark corner in her favourite bookstore, her knees clutched to her chest and trembling fiercely._

"_Hey," he greeted her softly as he sat down beside her._

_She raised her head to look at him for a moment through tear filled eyes before flinging herself into his waiting arms._

"_Shhh. It's okay, it's okay," he whispered as he rubbed her back in a soothing fashion as she clung to him like he was the only safe thing around. After a few minutes of his ministrations, she calmed down and as she loosened her grip on him, he asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"_

_Hermione sniffled before she began to talk, "All we were doing was making ourselves miserable with all of our constant bickering. So I told him that I wanted to break up with him. He wasn't happy, tried to reconcile things, but I told him that it wouldn't be fair to him for us to continue dating when I had feelings for someone else. We got into a fight and he asked me who it was, and... and I told him..."_

_Before he knew what he was doing, Harry had asked, "Who is it?"_

_He felt Hermione tense up in his arms, and he mentally kicked himself,_ 'Smooth work, Potter.'

_But then, before he could apologise, he felt Hermione's lips press against his own. _

_For a moment, he was frozen in place, but then his desire for her roared to life and he responded with every ounce of passion that he had in him. As the kiss progressed, it grew more and more heated, with Hermione shifting over onto his lap at one point. When the need for air grew imminent, they parted, resting their foreheads together as they caught their breath._

"_In case that didn't answer your question Harry, it's you," she whispered._

_He drew back then and framed her face with his hands, and as he smiled warmly at her, Hermione knew without a doubt that Harry shared her feelings. With a smile of her own she leaned forward and captured his lips again in a slow and savouring kiss. They parted a few minutes later, and though he was extremely reluctant to do so, Harry gently nudged Hermione, silently asking her to hop off him. "I need to get back to my patrol," he explained at her curious expression as he got to his feet and then offered her a helping hand._

_Hermione sighed as she pulled herself to her feet. "I wish the Ministry would stop using you like this."_

"_They're not using me, 'Mione. Shacklebolt wouldn't have posted me here if they felt I wasn't ready."_

_She looked at him curiously. "Ready?"_

"_This is my first assignment."_

"_First assignment? Oh, Harry!" Hermione exclaimed as she hit him with one of her famous knock-the-wind-out-of-you hugs. After a moment she pulled back, and as she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, she looked confused about something. "But, how can you be? You've only been in the training programme for eight months, and from what I've read Auror trainees only start to do assignments in their second year."_

_Harry shot her a look of mock horror. "You've forgotten about the Horcrux hunt already? Not to mention everything else we've been through in the past eight years? Oh, Hermione, how _could_ you?" Hermione playfully punched him in the arm, which earned a chortle from Harry before he swooped down to give her a kiss._

"_You know, if you don't stop doing that, I won't be able to let you get back to your patrol," Hermione commented when Harry pulled back._

"_Who said I wanted you to?" he asked, seemingly serious._

"_Do you want me to-" she started to respond, but then she spotted his mischievous smile and realized that he was teasing her. "You're impossible, you know that?"_

_Harry just laughed before kissing her on the forehead. "Only for you, 'Mione, only for you. It's alright, though, you've probably got a list of things to do before you have to head back."_

_He was right, she did have things she had to do, but knowing that it would be quite some time before she saw him again, she was reluctant to leave her boyfriend's, and she felt a burst of euphoria shoot through her at the word, side._

_And, as if understanding what was going through her mind, Harry gently cupped her cheek. "It's alright," he soothed. "I'll come and see you before you return to Hogwarts, I promise."_

_Hermione smiled and nodded her head. Harry returned the gesture before turning and heading for the door. He had just stepped back outside when he heard Hermione call out his name. He turned to face her, and, before he knew what was going on, she was on him, arms around his neck and lips pressed firmly against his. For a moment he was stunned, but then he responded to her kiss with equal intensity._

_It wasn't until they'd heard a sharp wolf-whistle a few minutes later that they drew apart, rosy cheeked and a bit breathless, to face the culprits._

_"Nice one, Harry," said Fred._

_"Knew you had it in you, mate," added George._

"_Fred, George," Harry greeted the Weasley twins, "What are you two doing here?"_

"_Checking up on our new shop, of course." came the unified reply before they turned to Hermione. "Hello, Hermione,"_

_Hermione greeted them in return. "Hello, Fred. Hello, George. Things are going well with the shop?"_

"_Better than ever!" George exclaimed. "You should drop by later on, Harry, so that we can show you our new stock."_

"_Once I've finished my patrol I will," Harry assured them._

"_And speaking of patrols," Fred started._

"_How's little Ronniekins doing?" George finished._

"_He's currently M.I.A."_

"_M.I.A?" the twins repeated, perplexed._

"_It's a Muggle war-time term; it means missing in action," Harry explained._

"_Have to tell Dad about that one," George stated._

"_In the mean time, we'll keep an eye out for Ron," Fred told Harry._

"_Thanks, and if you do see him, tell him to get his arse back here, and that we've got a job to do."_

"_Will do, Harry!" the twins exclaimed before heading on their way._

_Harry turned to Hermione. "Will you be alright?"_

_Hermione nodded. "You're sure that you don't want me to come with you?"_

_He pressed a kiss to her forehead. "I'm sure. I'll see you later, Okay?"_

"_Okay."_

_With a smile, he dropped his arm from her waist and drew his wand. Concentrating on the message he wanted to send to Neville, he sent his stag Patronus on its way and then he headed in the opposite direction. _

– – o – – o – –

_After watching Harry, until he had disappeared from sight, Hermione turned and headed back inside the bookshop._

– – o – – o – –

_Harry had just gotten to the outskirts of the village again when a horrifying sight appeared in the sky: the Dark Mark. '_The Carrows have made their move,' _Harry thought grimly as he headed towards the Mark_, 'And now it's our turn. I just hope that no one gets hurt during our duel.'

_But when he rounded the corner to see what shop the Mark was hovering over, he stopped dead in his tracks. There before him was Talon's Bookshop, where, just minutes ago, he and Hermione had shared their first kiss._

'Something's not right. The place is still intact.'

_Then he heard a cackle of laughter, and felt fear grip him when he spotted Alecto, who gave him a sick little wave, before:_ "Confringo."

"_NO!" Harry barrelled forward, intent on knocking Alecto over, but in his rage, he forgot about Amycus._

"Petrificus Totalus.Mobilicorpus."

_Amycus manipulated Harry's frozen form until he was facing the collapsing building._

"_Now, Potter," the Death Eater spoke into his frozen ear with a satisfied tone, "you can watch your friends and loved ones die like you forced _us_ to when you killed the Dark Lord!"_

_Unseen to Amycus as he continued to taunt Harry, Neville had come stealthily around the corner, and upon seeing his friend in trouble, reacted, _"Stupefy."_The force of the charm knocked Amycus unconscious and Neville bounded forward, "_Finite Incantatem."

_At the incantation, Harry dropped to the earth, free from the spells that Amycus had cast on him. "Thanks, Neville."_

"_Don't mention it."_

"Sectumsempra," _roared a now revived Amycus as his sister turned her own rage on Neville._

_Harry cried out in pain as several slashes were inflicted onto his chest._

"_Harry!"_

"_I'm fine," Harry responded through gritted teeth._

"Defodio."

_Harry heard Amycus stifle his cry of pain as gouges appeared in his wand hand._

"Diffindo."

_This last spell came from Rebecca as she and Pan bounded up to where Harry stood. _

_Amycus roared in pain, the charm cutting the already wounded flesh of his wand hand, crippling it and unable to keep a grip, he dropped his wand. _

_Seeing her brother in trouble, Alecto came swiftly to his defence. _"Depulso."

_Rebecca, unable to counter-attack in time, was struck by the jinx and slammed into the building behind her with a cry of pain before crumpling onto the ground. _

_Seeing his mistress fall, Pan took to the air, screeching furiously as he dove at the Carrows. The bombardment forced the Death Eaters to turn their attention to defending themselves from the angry griffin, and both Harry and Neville saw their chance to end the deadly duel and seized it. In quick succession, the two young men cast the spells needed to subdue the Death Eater siblings whilst they were preoccupied, _"Langlock. Petrificus Totalus. Incarcerous."

_Had the situation not been so grim, Harry would have laughed at the Carrows frozen and bound forms as they wobbled on the spot like Muggle bowling pins before toppling over. With a slight wince from pain of the wounds on his chest, Harry turned to face the ruined shop as Professors McGonagall, Sprout, Flitwick and Slughorn Apparated into the clearing._

"_Oh my goodness!" exclaimed Sprout_

"Deletrius," _squeaked Flitwick and the Dark Mark vanished from sight._

"_Levitation charm on three," McGonagall instructed. "One, two, three... _Wingardium Leviosa."

_As the top layer of rubble rose into the air, the men of the village began to retrieve those who had been trapped inside it as it had collapsed. The Headmistress gave a slight start when a familiar figure with messy black hair passed her, followed by Rebecca Knight and her griffin familiar._

"_Harry?" McGonagall inquired._

_Harry stopped and turned, "Professor," he greeted her with a nod of his head._

"_What are you doing here?"_

"_Neville, Ron and I were the Aurors posted here to catch the Carrows."_

"_But you're still trainees!"_

_Harry had just opened his mouth to respond when:_

"_Harry, over here!" Rebecca called out, waving him over to where Pan was digging for something beneath a fallen bookcase. "I think Pan's found her." __Harry drew his wand, wincing in the process, which Rebecca didn't fail to see. "Here, let me," she drew her own wand._ "Wingardium Leviosa."

_As the bookcase levitated into the air, Hermione's curled up form was revealed and Harry stepped in to scoop her up, her scarf falling to the ground as he did so._

"_You must take her to the Hospital Wing straight away, Harry," McGonagall called to him._

"_On it," Harry replied, moving away from the devastated building before he Dissapparated with a _crack_. When he reappeared, he was outside Hogwarts iron gates. Adjusting his grip on Hermione's unconscious form, Harry strode forward into the grounds._

_Half an hour later found him striding into the Hospital Wing. "Madame Pomfrey?"_

"_Here, Mr. Potter."_

_Harry turned to see the Hospital matron waiting by one of the beds and strode over to her, gently placing Hermione on the bed._

"_What happened?" Pomfrey questioned as she began to cast diagnostic charms on Hermione._

"_A bookcase fell on her when the shop she was in collapsed." '_But compared to what the Carrows _could _have done to her in order to get to me, she got off very, **very** lightly,_' Harry added silently to himself. _

_Pomfrey winced, but said nothing, continuing to diagnose her patient._

"_There's no internal injuries," she declared after a minute. "She'll be stiff and sore for a few days, but otherwise, she's fine."_

_Harry let out a relieved breath._

_Pomfrey then fixed her gaze on him. "But it seems that you weren't as lucky, Mr Potter. Dark curse?"_

"_Sectumsempra__," Harry confirmed._

"_It's a good thing that Severus taught me the counter-curse before he was killed. Cloak, jumper and shirt off," she instructed as she turned and left the room to retrieve something._

_Harry did as she asked, but as he peeled his shirt off, he winced as he pulled the fabric away from where it had set on his wounds._

"_A nasty piece of work," Madame Pomfrey stated as she studied the three diagonal gashes after she had returned with a flask of a bluish coloured potion in hand. "I'm afraid I'm currently out of Dittany, Mr Potter. I'll be able to heal the wounds with the counter-curse, but without Dittany to put on the wounds, they will scar."_

"_That's fine," Harry stated. "And I expected nothing less from the Carrows," _

_Madame Pomfrey merely shook her head before raising her wand to the wound_s. "Vulnera Sanatur. Vulnera Sanatur. Vulnera Sanatur."

_When she finished the incantation the first time, the flow of his blood coming from the wounds eased up. The second time, his wounds knitted together. But the third time didn't appear to do anything physically. Harry looked to Madame Pomfrey, and shot her a curious expression. _

"_The third time removes the worst effects of the curse near-instantly," the matron explained._

"_Thank you, Madame Pomfrey," Harry sincerely stated, "for everything."_

_Pomfrey smiled at him warmly, before handing him the flask of potion. "When Miss Granger is feeling up to it, have her drink this. It will help with the bruises and stiffness." Harry nodded his head and Pomfrey turned to Hermione. _"Rennervate."

_Hermione eyes snapped open and Harry stepped forward. "Hey," he greeted in a whisper._

_Hermione blinked her eyes as her vision refocused. "Hey."_

– – o – – o – –

_Rebecca sighed in frustration._

_Try as she might to send Pan on his way, the griffin was still devotedly following the carriage she was on and showing no intention of leaving._

_In a last ditch attempt, she waved her arms frantically. "Go home, Pan! Shoo!" _

_But in her attempt to get her familiar on his way home, she knocked Hermione's scarf, which she had collected from the building ruins after Harry had Disapparated, from her lap. As she vaulted from the carriage to the ground, Pan picked up the scarf and walked over to his mistress. _

_But when she tried to take it from him, Pan held on to it. Rebecca furrowed her brow in confusion at his behaviour, but when he gently tugged at the scarf, realisation dawned on her as to what he was trying to get across to her. "You want to see Hermione?"_

_Pan dropped the scarf and chirruped in affirmation._

"_I'm not sure that Madame Pomfrey will allow you into the Hospital Wing, though, Pan," Rebecca said as she placed a hand to his face._

_Pan nibbled her palm in encouragement._

"_Oi! If you don't want to get left behind, Becca, then I suggest you hurry up!" Ginny hollered back to her class-mate, which drew Rebecca's attention to the retreating Thestral-drawn cart._

– – o – – o – –

_Hermione could only shake her head as Harry finished bringing her up to speed with all that had happened. "Oh Harry! You're never going to be able to stay out of trouble, are you?"_

"_You know me, 'Mione, I just love the quiet life," Harry replied, shooting her an adorable smile._

_Hermione just fisted her hand in the material of the T-shirt that Kreacher had brought to Harry a few minutes ago, tugged him off of the chair he was sitting on, next to the head of the bed, so that he was closer to her and sealed her mouth to his. As the kiss progressed, Harry had to check himself from crushing Hermione against him and causing her further discomfort._

_It was only when Madame Pomfrey loudly cleared her throat a few minutes later that the two drew apart._

"_The potion, Mr. Potter," the matron reminded him._

"_Right," he responded, rubbing the back of his neck in a familiar gesture of nervousness._

"_Potion?" Hermione queried her boyfriend._

"_Madame Pomfrey gave me a potion to help with the bruising and stiffness. She said to give it to you when you were feeling up to it," Hermione held out a hand and Harry gave her the flask. "I have to warn you though, it doesn't have the best taste."_

_Hermione raised an eyebrow, silently questioning as to how he knew this._

"_Fifth year. First Quidditch match of the season, one Bludger to the back and one to the chest," he reminded her. "And if I remember rightly, you Mother Henning me for nearly two weeks afterwards."_

_Hermione could only blush before she drained the potion, pulling a face in disgust when she'd finished. _

"_Told you," he smirked._

"_Miss Knight! Where do you think you're going?" Madame Pomfrey questioned, drawing Harry and Hermione's attention from each other to the matron as she stood at the door, blocking Rebecca's path._

"_Uh... inside to visit Hermione?" came Rebecca's response._

"_Not with that beast you're not!" the matron told her sternly._

_Pan let out an indignant screech at the insult._

"_Pan's well behaved, Madame Pomfrey, I can assure you of that. He just wants to see for himself that Hermione's alright."_

_Madame Pomfrey relented. "He may go in. But I'm warning you, any commotions-"_

"_There won't be," Rebecca reassured the matron._

_With a nod of her head, Madame Pomfrey let Rebecca and Pan through the door._

_Pan immediately went to Hermione's side and gently nibbled on her fingers, his eyes conveying his concern._

"_I'm fine, Pan," Hermione assured the griffin._

"_You told me that Harry has a knack for finding trouble," Rebecca told her friend with a grin as she approached the bed. "You failed to mention that you seem to do that as well." __Following his mistress' words, Pan clicked his beak and chirruped for a few moments, sounding like he was trying to say something. "That's griffin speak for, 'Don't do that again!'" Rebecca translated._

_Hermione laughed. "Don't worry Pan, I don't intend to. And I guess that is what happens when you hang around with Harry Potter." At this she looked to Harry. "No offense meant, of course."_

_Harry's response was to thread his fingers through hers and bring her hand to his lips for a brief kiss. Watching the two of them together, Rebecca's grin was brighter than any Lumos that she'd ever cast, but she kept her words to herself and didn't say a thing._

_But their moment was broken by the arrival of a lion Patronus._

"_Harry, the Carrows have been delivered to Azkaban. Shacklebolt has ordered us back to Auror Headquarters to be de-briefed."_

_With a sigh, Harry let his head fall forward, pillowing it in Hermione's stomach. Letting go of his hand, Hermione began to run her fingers through his hair in a soothing fashion - understanding that while Harry didn't want to leave her side just yet, he also couldn't afford to disobey Shacklebolt's orders - hoping to silently convey that she would be alright. It seemed to work, because when he drew back, he was relaxed. "Thank you," he murmured before standing up and retrieving his cloak. As he was securing it, Harry looked to Rebecca and Pan. "Thank you, the both of you, for your help today."_

_Rebecca was stunned by the praise. "_Me_? But I didn't do much!"_

"_You crippled Amycus," Harry told her, "and Pan's distraction allowed Neville and I to get the upper hand in the duel and end it. Without your help, the duel would have gone on for a _lot_ longer than it did"_

"_What can I say? We Gryffindors have to stick together," she stated simply in response._

_Harry laughed. "Agreed."_

_Turning back to Hermione, Harry bent down and the couple shared a tender kiss. When he drew back, he whispered, "Take care and... I love you."_

_Hermione tenderly cupped his cheek. "Stay safe and I love you too"_

_After one last kiss, Harry turned and strode from the room._

When Harry had returned to his quarters after being de-briefed by Shacklebolt and Tonks, his Auror mentor, he had found a fuming Ron waiting for him. A blazing row had soon erupted between the two of them, and Ron had told Harry that because of what he'd done he was no friend of his and in no uncertain terms that their friendship was over.

But while things with Ron had gone pear-shaped, his relationship with Hermione was flourishing.

When he'd started his training, he had kept in contact with Hermione via owl post, but once they became a couple, he had also started using the Floo Network, and when he could, he'd come to Hogwarts to have dinner with her.

His first dinner visit was particularly memorable.

"_Miss Granger, could you wait a moment please?" Professor Sprout called to Hermione, who was packing up her bag as the last class of the day came to an end._

"_I'll see you at dinner," Rebecca told her before shouldering her bag and leaving Greenhouse Eight._

_Hermione approached Professor Sprout. "Yes, Professor?"_

"_Professor McGonagall wants to see you in her office. You haven't done anything wrong," the Herbology professor quickly added upon seeing Hermione tense up. "She just wants to speak with you about something."_

_Hermione nodded her head, said a quick, "Thank you Professor," before turning and leaving the Greenhouse._

_Three quarters of an hour later found Hermione knocking on the Headmistress' door._

"_Come in," came McGonagall's voice._

_Hermione entered and as she turned to close the door behind her, the two figures that had been talking to the Headmistress turned to look at her. When Hermione turned back around to address McGonagall, she froze._

_There before her were her parents, Jake and Miranda Granger._

"_Mum? Dad?" she queried, her voice barely a whisper._

_Jake smiled at his baby girl whilst Miranda held out her arms in invitation. With tears welling in her eyes, Hermione dashed forward to embrace her parents, dropping her bag in the process._

"Accio Hermione's bag." _With nimble hands, Harry caught his girlfriend's bag, knowing that Hermione would never forgive herself if she damaged her books in any way._

_The three Grangers continued to hold onto one another, talking in hushed tones. And as Harry watched them, a feeling of warmth enveloped him at the relieved expression on Hermione's features. Eventually, Hermione broke away from her parents and approached him, wrapping him up in a hug and clutching him to her like he was the most precious thing around. "Thank you," she whispered into his neck. "Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you." She repeated the word as if saying once wasn't enough to convey her emotions across to him properly._

_Harry pulled back, wiped away her tears with the pad of him thumb before kissing her on the forehead briefly. "It's Shacklebolt that you owe your thanks to, 'Mione. He's the one who gave the order that you parents be found. And St. Mungo's Medi-wizards for reversing the false memory charm you put on them. All I did was volunteer to bring them to Hogwarts so that the three of you could be reunited."_

"_You played a part in bringing them back, that's all that matters to me."_

"_What are friends for?"_

_At this Hermione pulled back_.

"_Friends?" she asked with a mock pout. "Did the kisses mean nothing to you?"_

_Harry laughed and gave her a chaste kiss on the lips. Hermione tightened her hug for a moment in response before letting him go and turning back to her parents. "Mum, Dad, I'd like you to meet Harry Potter. Harry, these are my parents, Jake and Miranda Granger."_

_Miranda stepped forward to embrace the young man of whom they'd had head so much about from their daughter. "It's a pleasure to meet you at last, Harry," she said as she stepped back_

_Jake offered his hand, which Harry shook. "Son."_

_Minerva McGonagall smiled at the scene before her. Her parent's absence had been one of Hermione's main worries. But now that her family was back together again, Minerva suspected that Hogwarts would see Hermione Granger back to achieving her full academic glory._

_Hermione broke Minerva from her thoughts. "Professor, would it be alright if I showed my parents around the school?"_

"_Not at all, Miss Granger. In fact, they're more than welcome to have dinner with us in the Great Hall this evening."_

_Hermione smiled, but when her eyes fell on Harry, her smile faltered a little. "You're able to stay for dinner, aren't you, Harry?" she asked, almost dreading his answer._

"_My orders were to accompany your parents. Wherever they go, I go." _

_Though his statement was said in a level tone, he smiled as the final words left his mouth, and Hermione hugged him tightly to express her joy._

The next few months had flown by in a blur and before long, Hermione found herself on the Hogwarts Express heading home for Christmas.

"_Hermione!" Miranda called out._

"_Yes, Mum?" Hermione called back._

"_There's someone's head in the fireplace!"_

"_I'm coming!" Hermione responded as she dashed out of her room. "Don't panic, we've probably been connected to the Floo Network temporarily."_

_When she skidded to a stop, she saw that it was Ron's head in the fire._

"_Ron?" she questioned as she knelt down by the fire._

"_Hey, Hermione," he greeted her._

_In the months that had past, Ron had reforged his friendship with Harry and Hermione after seeing that Harry was able to make Hermione much happier than he had ever done._

"_What happened to your face?"_

_Though it was hard to see with the flickering flames around his head, there was a two inch long cut on his left cheek._

"_Training accident. But don't worry about me," he spoke hastily when Hermione opened her mouth to respond. "It's Harry that you should be concerned about."_

"_Why? What's happened?"_

"_He turned down having Christmas with us at the Burrow; said he wanted to be alone."_

"_He said WHAT?"_

_Ron grinned. "Figured you'd respond like this. It hasn't been long. If you hurry, you'll catch him before he and Kreacher start dinner."_

_Hermione scrambled to her feet. "Thanks, Ron. Merry Christmas," she called over her shoulder as she dashed back to her room._

"_Likewise," he called back before his head disappeared with a _pop_._

_When Hermione reappeared, she had put on some shoes and was just pulling on a coat as she looked to her mother. "You don't mind if I invite Harry here for Christmas, do you?"_

"_Not at all, sweetheart. You know that your friends are always welcome here."_

_Hermione paused at that, she'd not yet had the chance to tell her parents that she and Harry were now a couple. '_I guess it's now or never,_' she thought before speaking, "I've been meaning to talk to you and Dad about that. Harry and I... we're more than just friends now... we started dating a couple of months ago, after Halloween."_

_Miranda smiled at her daughter's admission, but it was not entirely unexpected. She and Jake had realised the night that the three Gangers had been reunited at Hogwarts that the two teens had become a couple. This realisation had not gone without complaints from Jake, who had grumbled about "losing his baby girl when he'd only just gotten her back." Miranda had become the young man's champion, telling her husband that Hermione could have done a lot worse than Harry Potter as he clearly thought the world of Hermione and that he respected her and had always protected and defended her from harm without a moment's hesitation._

"_We know, honey."_

"_You... You _know_?"_

_Miranda nodded her head. "It wasn't all that long ago that your father and I were in the same position."_

"_And you're okay with it?"_

"_No," Jake called from the lounge room, where he was reading the day's newspaper._

"_Jake, behave!" Miranda chided her husband. "Of course we are, darling._

_Hermione smiled warmly at her mother._

"_You had better get going if you want to catch Harry in time," Miranda reminded her daughter._

"_Right. I shouldn't be long," she stated as she dashed outside, stopped still behind a tree and checked to make sure that no one was watching before she Disapparated._

_Half an hour passed before Hermione returned, holding hands with a rather sheepish looking Harry._

_Miranda greeted Harry with a hug. "It's wonderful to see you again, Harry."_

"_It's good to see you too Mrs. Granger," Harry returned the greeting before turning his attention to Hermione's father. "Hello Mr. Granger."_

"_Hello, Harry. How's Auror training going?"_

"_It's going well. But I'm grateful for the break."_

"_Bit of R'n'R, huh?"_

"_You could say that."_

"_Come on, Harry," Hermione tugged at his arm. "I'll show you to your room."_

_Harry followed her down the hall and listened as Hermione pointed out the rooms as she walked. "That's the Bathroom; that's the Guest Room." She pointed to the open door at the end of the hall. "And that's my room."_

_Harry opened the door to his room and placed his bag inside before going to have a look at Hermione's room. As he stepped inside, his eyes were drawn instantly to a bird cage in one of the corners. Inside was the most beautiful barn owl that he'd ever seen._

"_Isn't one familiar enough for you?" he teased her_

_Hermione's eyes widened, and she mentally kicked herself; she'd forgotten all about the she-owl. "She's not for me... she's for you," she admitted._

_Harry looked at her, gobsmacked. "For _me_?"_

"_I know that she'll never replace Hedwig... and you don't have to take her if you don't feel ready... but you said in your letters that you felt a little disadvant-"_

_Hermione's speech was brought to a screeching halt when Harry swooped down and kissed her._

"_Don't take this the wrong way, love, but sometimes you talk too much," he told her when they drew apart. _

_Hermione watched as Harry strode over to the cage, opened the door and gently put his hand inside. The barn owl immediately stepped onto Harry's offered hand and he carefully extracted her from the cage. Free from the confined space, the owl flapped her wings a couple of times before turning her head to look at Harry. As man and beast regarded each other, Harry brought a hand up to stroke the barn owl's feathers, and she responded in turn by nibbling on his fingers._

_After a few moments, Harry looked to Hermione. "Thank you."_

_Hermione smiled. "Consider her your Christmas present from me. What are you going to call her?"_

_Harry regarded the barn owl for a moment. "Athena."_

"_Athena?" Hermione repeated. "Like the Greek Goddess of wisdom?" _

"_Owls are perceived to be wise animals," Harry stated._

_Hermione just pecked him on the cheek, seeing right through his bluff. "I'm honoured."_

_Harry chuckled and was just leaning in to give Hermione a proper kiss when:_

"_Kids! Lunch is ready!"_

TBC...

27


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Notes:**

The overnight response I got when I posted this story was _unbelievable_. **Never** in my five years of posting here have I had a reaction like it. I want to thank all of those who took the time to read my story and responded, I hope that I do not disappoint you with the future chapters.

Thanks go to Blueglaceon for being the most wonderful Beta in the world.

Thanks also go to MissAnnThropic, who has allowed me to borrow ideas and exerts from her brilliant story _Vox Corporis_.

And ya'll know the drill; Harry Potter doesn't belong to me.

Rebecca Knight, Pan and Athena and every other character that you haven't heard of do, so no touchies without permission.

**Chapter 2**

That Christmas spent with the Grangers had been a most enjoyable experience, because up until that point Harry had ever only known two types of Christmas celebrations: pre-Hogwarts, where he had spent the day at the beck and call of the Dursleys_,_ and Hogwarts, where he had been one of the few orphans who had stayed at school because they had no other place to go for the holidays. But Harry had known, from the moment that he had entered the Granger household, that that Christmas, and every other in the years to come, would be like that one Christmas spent at Grimmauld Place with Sirius and the Weasleys'.

And he had been right, he had never felt more at home then he did with Hermione's family.

Miranda had taken it upon herself to mother the young man from the get-go, which had included a _three_ hour shopping trip in the first couple of days.

_Hermione found it very easy to get lost in a book. In text she was all her strength, nothing of the gangly, ugly, unpopular, and at times insecure girl. She was her mind, and that was her greatest power. It was an indulgence to surrender to it. Admittedly, sometimes she escaped to it. It grew from that into an ability to hone in so singularly on what she was reading that the rest of the world was background noise to the words. She was sitting on her bed reading a thick, heavy tome propped on her lap. Crookshanks was curled on her pillow behind and to the right of her, dozing with legs folded tight beneath him until he looked like a ginger ball of fur with slits for eyes and a piggish pink nose._

_She'd completely lost track of the time, so when a soft knock came at her door she started as though someone had kicked it. Crookshanks popped open his eyes when her jump made the mattress move, but after a half-second survey merely closed his eyes again._

"_Yes?" Hermione called._

_The door opened and Harry stuck his head inside, his eyes searching the room and quickly settling on her._

"_Harry! Back so soon?"_

_Harry frowned in bewilderment. "Soon? We were gone three hours."_

_Hermione glanced at her clock. He was right; she'd done it again. _

_She laid her hands on the open pages of the guilty book. "Oh. _Three hours?"

_Harry sagged at the reminder and walked into her room. With dragging steps he crossed to her bed, fell forward, and lay perfectly still across the foot. Crookshanks, roused again at the second jostling in less than five minutes, turned a glower on Harry._

_Hermione snickered. "I'm so sorry, Harry." _

_She suspected the snickering negated her words as far as sympathy was concerned. Harry mumbled something but it was muffled by the comforter into which he had his face pressed. Hermione snorted, leaned forward, and pushed on his shoulder._

_Harry rolled over on to his back. "I said I hope I don't have to do that again."_

"_I imagine not. Mum just hated seeing you wear those dingy old clothes of Dudley's. How much did you get?"_

_Harry raked both hands through his hair as though to dishevel himself enough would erase the tameness of the outing. "Not nearly half as your mother would have liked. But I don't_ need_ that much! I mean, your mother's really nice, but three hours, Hermione! I_ almost_ feel sorry for Dudley when Aunt Petunia takes him clothes shopping. They're always gone the entire day. To think I used to be even the _tiniest_ jealous about that!" With a sigh Harry closed his eyes and Hermione watched in fascination as his features relaxed, his mouth softened, his whole body seemed to unwind and lay prone and loose in what might have appeared to be a precursor to sleep._

_Crookshanks picked his way across the bed and sniffed delicately at Harry's face._

_Harry screwed up his face and waved the cat away. "Crookshanks." The cat persisted, whiskers twitching against Harry's nose and chin._

"_Did you and Mum stop for ice cream?" Hermione asked suspiciously._

_Harry cracked open one eye at her while he continued to push at Crookshanks and seemed to question how she knew. "Yeah."_

_Hermione smiled. "Mum usually takes me after shopping, consolation prize I suppose; Crookshanks smells it on your breath. He loves ice cream."_

"_Well, next time I'll bring you some," Harry said. Crookshanks seemed to accept that and lay down on the bed beside Harry's shoulder._

"_Here you two are." Miranda stated from the doorway, and the two teens looked to her, "I thought as much. And, Harry, I'm sorry if I was a bit much today."_

"_Oh, uh... that's okay, Mrs. Granger."_

_Miranda switched to addressing her daughter with a playful light in her eyes. "Once he started trying on clothes that actually fit I got a bit overzealous, I suppose." _

_Hermione glanced at Harry and saw him cringe. _

_Miranda, heedless, continued, "Don't know if you realize it, dear, but when you get past those ratty old clothes of his cousin's he's a good-looking boy."_

_Harry was blushing furiously._

"_I know," Hermione said matter-of-factly._

"_I thought he could do with a fair bit more than we came away with, but Harry started looking a bit flighty. Thought it best to call it a day before he ran for it."_

_Hermione giggled. "Probably a good decision; Harry's a fast runner. If he made a break for it you'd never catch him._

Harry had also gotten on quite well with Jake.

Expectedly, Hermione's father had pulled him aside after lunch on the first day for a little chat regarding him and Hermione; _"If you hurt her," _he'd said,_ "I'll hurt you, wizard or no."_

With his fatherly duties out of the way, Jake had been glad to have another guy in the house with whom he could talk guy-stuff with.

"_Oh," Hermione brightened, "you ought to have Harry explain Quidditch to you, Dad. I know I've done a ruddy job, but Harry knows all about it. He was Gryffindor's Seeker whilst he was at school."_

To help Jake better understand the game, Harry had given him his copy of _Quidditch Through The Ages_, that year's birthday present from Hermione.

"_It looks like an absolutely _fascinating_ game. And you played this 'Seeker' position?"_

_Harry nodded._

"_From this book, looks like quite a tough spot to play."_

_Hermione looked up from her homework and grinned. "Oh, it's the most challenging Quidditch position on the whole team. The Seeker has to be the fastest, with the best reflexes, and has to be fearless. Some of the manoeuvres I've seen Harry pull off chasing that infernal golden ball..."_

_Jake looked to Harry with a smirk and winked at him. "And Hermione says she doesn't know a thing about Quidditch."_

"_Hermione knows something about everything; if she says she doesn't know anything then she's plain lying," Harry answered and Hermione harrumphed before turning back to her homework._

And then of course, there was Hermione.

By an unspoken agreement, the two of them had spent the majority of their time together, whether that be just longing around the house talking, Hermione doing her homework with Harry watching on and helping her when needed or making out underneath Hermione's favourite tree in the garden, knowing that once the break was over it would be a while before they would be together again.

Harry had also cooked for the family whenever he could, though Miranda had tried to dissuade him at first, but had relented after Harry had told her that it was the least he could do to say thank you to them for having him.

The lazy days spent at the Grangers had seemed to fly by, and before long it was Christmas Eve.

_Hermione looked at the clock on her bedside table; 11:15. _

_As was the norm on Christmas Eve, she couldn't sleep._

_With a sigh she rose from her bed, left her bedroom and tiptoed down the hall and into the kitchen to get herself a cup of hot chocolate._

_Fifteen minutes later, she found herself tiptoeing back towards her room. She had just stopped at her door when a muffled noise from Harry's room caught her attention. Backtracking to his door, she opened it, stepped inside and looked to the bed. Harry was tossing and turning violently, clearly in the grips of a nightmare._

_Crossing the room, she had just set her mug on the bedside table when Harry startled awake with a cry, scrambling upright, his shirtless form gulping in air. Taking a seat on the edge of his bed, Hermione reached out to touch his forehead, but the moment her fingers touched his skin, he recoiled away from her._

_Hermione's heart raged as she realised that he was bracing to be hit._

'Damn the Dursleys!' _she seethed to herself. _'They should consider themselves lucky that Harry's reconciled things with them, because if he hadn't, I'd have cursed them into next week for all the things that they've done to the man that I love.'

_Her train of thought was broken by Harry's voice, "'Mione?"_

"_Hey," she whispered to him, tentatively reaching out to touch his cheek with the pads of her fingers and was relieved when Harry placed his hand over hers, pressing her hand fully against his skin. "You okay?"_

"_Bad dream."_

_They were silent then, and as Harry became fully aware of his surroundings, he spoke up to explain his knee-jerk reaction, "I'm sorry, I thought that I was back at the Dursleys."_

_Hermione just scooted forward, dropped her hand from his face before wrapping her arms around him. "It's okay," she soothed as he nestled his head in her crook of her neck and she began to run her fingers through his hair - which she had learned, just days prior, helped to relax him, evidenced by the fact that he had fallen asleep in her lap. And sure enough, after a few minutes, she felt his eyes flutter shut and his breathing even out to a steady even rhythm. She carefully lowered Harry back to the mattress and then slipped in under the covers herself, snuggling up to him as she too drifted off._

When Christmas day had dawned, Miranda had been slightly startled to find her daughter asleep in their guest's bed, because up until that point Harry been nothing but a gentleman in regards to his courtship of Hermione, which had been one of the main reasons that Jake had warmed up to Harry so quickly. When Hermione had realised that they'd had company, she'd carefully extracted herself from her boyfriend's sleeping form and had gone to track down her mother and talk to her.

"_It was not what it looked like," Hermione told her mother when she found her in the kitchen. "I couldn't sleep last night, so I came out here to get a cup of hot chocolate. Harry was having a nightmare when was heading back to my room so I went in to comfort him and I kind of fell asleep in the process," she ended sheepishly_

"_Don't worry, sweetheart; you're not in trouble."_

_Hermione blinked; this was not the response she had expected._

_Miranda chuckled at her daughter. "You_ are _adults now, after all. Your father and I trust you, the both of you, to do the right thing."_

_Hermione relaxed and then hugged her mother. "Merry Christmas, Mom."_

"_Merry Christmas, sweetheart."_

_As mother and daughter drew apart, Jake ambled into the kitchen, stretching and yawning, "Merry Christmas, girls," he greeted his wife and daughter._

"_Merry Christmas, Dad," Hermione pecked her father on the cheek before heading towards Harry's room to wake her boyfriend so that the day's celebrations could begin._

– – o – – o – –

_An hour later found Harry sitting on the couch. _

_They'd unwrapped all their presents, and at the current moment Jake and Miranda were in the kitchen busily preparing breakfast. Hermione lay against her boyfriend, using his lap as a pillow as she eagerly read Rebecca's present whilst another, from Harry, was waiting in the wings_.

"_What have you got there?" Jake questioned his daughter as he return to the lounge room with a cup of coffee in hand._

_Hermione looked to her father, "_Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them._"_

"_Who's it from?"_

"_Rebecca Knight. She's one of my surrogate class-mates. I was talking to her on the platform when you came to pick me up at the start of the holidays; copper-hair, green-eyes," she reminded her father_

"_The girl with the griffin?"_

"_His name is Pan. He's Rebecca's familiar."_

"_She has a pet _griffin_?" Jake asked incredulously _

"_Familiars are more than just pets, Dad. They can't be owned, rather, they are a consciousness in their own right and deserving of great respect," __Hermione explained as she rested the still open book on her chest. "__A __magical familiar__ is an animal associate with an intimate and bonded relationship with a human. __The word 'familiar' is short for 'familiar spirit', where an object or animal contains or possessed by a spirit companion that helps a magician or witch.__ A witch or wizard would never really refer to a familiar as "my owl" or "my cat" as a mere possession. On the contrary, a familiar has its own name, personality, and independent desires and thoughts. A familiar acts as an intermediary for the witch or wizard. As a witch's or wizard's partner, will perform tasks such as the carriage of messages; __owl__ familiars will fly around the world if the witch or wizard requests it, aid in spellwork; such as allowing themselves to be experimented on in __Transfiguration__-"_

_Hermione was cut off by Harry's sudden laughter and she looked at him curiously._

"_Remember in second year, when we were transfiguring animals into water goblets?"_

_Hermione caught on to what he was referring and began to laugh as well._

_Jake looked between the two mirthful teens before plaintively asking, "Care to explain to your dear ol' Muggle father what you two all powerful magician's are laughing about?"_

_Harry calmed himself. "Like I said, we were transfiguring animals into water goblets. After being shown what to do by Professor McGonagall, Ron was asked to go first, but at the time his wand wasn't working properly because of a run in with the Whomping Willow at the start of the year, so when he used the spell, it only half worked, which transformed his then familiar Scabbers into a furry water goblet, complete with a wriggling tail."_

_Jake began to laugh as well__._

_When the three of them had calmed down, Hermione continued on with her explanation, "They'll also offer hair for __potion work__, companionship, and guard and protect the witch or wizard from any danger. Unlike pets, familiars will go wherever the witch or wizard goes, even if it means going into the arms of death."_

_Harry could only chuckle at Hermione's familiar thoroughness. _

"_Let me guess:__ third year?" he silently questioned as to when she'd done her research._

_Hermione nodded her head.__ "After Mum and Dad said that they'd let me buy something for my birthday."_

"_And did you really want an owl at first?"_

"_I did. After seeing you and Hedwig, seeing the bond that the two of you had..." Hermione suddenly trailed off._

_Understanding what was going through Hermione's mind - that Hedwig had been more than just his familiar, she had been a part of his introduction to the wizarding world and his first real friend - Harry took one of her hands in his and gently squeezed it and smiled when she looked at him. "It's okay," he told her softly._

_Seeing Jake's curious expression, Harry explained, "Hedwig was my first familiar. But she was killed last year as the Order was escorting me to safety."_

_But any further conversation between them was halted when Miranda announced, "Harry, Athena's back."_

_Harry turned his head and raised an arm as the barn owl silently soared towards him. The she owl landed, mindful not to dig her talons into the bare skin of her master's forearm, and Harry removed the three envelopes that she had been carrying._

"_Anything from the Dursleys?"_

"_Mmmhmm," he replied as he opened the first envelope; a Christmas card. "It's from Dudley."_

"_From Dudley?" she parroted._

"_Mmmhmm, Dudley and I are on pretty good terms now," he explained. "That run-in with the Dementor before fifth year really knocked some sense in to him about his behaviour towards me over the years."_

"_And about time," she muttered._

_With a soft chuckle, Harry opened the remaining envelopes. The first was another Christmas card from the Weasleys', the second a note from the Lupins;_

'Harry,

Dora, Teddy and I will be coming to see you at the Grangers' some time on Christmas Day.

Merry Christmas,

Remus'

_Hermione saw the warm expression engulf Harry's face, but before she could question him about it, Miranda announced, "Breakfast's ready!"_

Over breakfast Harry had told the Grangers of Remus' letter and plans. Miranda had told him that, if they were there in time, they were more than welcome to stay for lunch.

_After breakfast, Miranda banished Harry from the kitchen. "It's my time to spoil you," she told him. When he started to protest, Hermione took Harry's hand in hers and led him outside into the backyard garden to relax and keep an eye out for Remus and Tonks. Athena and Crookshanks trailed after them. _

_Two hours passed before Miranda alerted Harry and Hermione of Remus and Tonks' arrival, and they made their way through the house and into the front yard to where the elder couple were waiting._

"_Wotcha you two!" came Tonks' trademark greeting._

"_Hey Tonks," Hermione greeted the metamorphmagus as Harry greeted Remus with a hug. "Remus." _

_When the two drew apart, Harry turned to Tonks and greeted her with a kiss on the cheek before turning his attention to little Teddy, whom Hermione had taken from Tonks whilst Harry had been greeting Remus. The seven month-old squealed when Harry lurched up to him like he was a booming monster and began to tickle him._

_By this time, Jake and Miranda had come out of the house and made their way over to the congregation._

_Hermione made the introductions, "Mum, Dad, I'd like you to meet Remus Lupin, his wife Nymphadora, who prefers to be called either Dora or Tonks and their son Teddy. Remus, Tonks, these are my parents: Jake and Miranda Granger."_

_The elder adults greeted each other before they all turned and headed inside. _

_As the others took a seat, Miranda returned to the kitchen, and Harry tried once again to offer his assistance, "Are you sure-"_

"_Sit," Miranda told him firmly._

_As Harry reluctantly took his seat, Tonks chuckled before teasing him, "What'd you do Harry? Burn the toast?"_

"_Quite the opposite," Hermione replied. "Harry's been cooking for us all holiday. Mum's been complaining that she's going to be several pounds heavier by the time Harry returns to Auror headquarters."_

"_She's not the only one. You've been complaining about it too," Harry teasingly reminded her and Hermione whacked him on the head with a rolled-up newspaper in response._

_Tonks and Remus just laughed._

_The rest of the day seemed to fly by, filled with discussions and mirth, and close to dinner-time the Lupins left to spend the evening meal with Tonks' mother._

When Christmas Day had come to an end, the rest of the break had flown by like someone had hit a fast-forward button, and all too soon it was time for the two of them to part ways once again.

_The two of them stood on the platform, wrapped up in an embrace, savouring their last few moments together._

"Hermione!_" Rebecca came bolting up to her. _

_As Hermione dropped her hold on Harry, she noticed that Pan wasn't by her friend's side._

"_You'll never guess what's happened!" Rebecca exclaimed as she came to a stop. "McGonagall's letting me take Pan back to Hogwarts!" Hermione let out a relieved breath at this. "Apparently Hagrid saw him when he was on the grounds at Halloween, and since he's studying Hippogriffs with his fourth year Care Of Magical Creatures class sometime this term, he decided he'd cover Griffins as well and he asked McGonagall if he could use Pan as a teaching aid!" _

"_I hope he can get on with Buckbeak," Harry mused._

_Rebecca shot a curious look at Harry. "You mean the grey Hippogriff of Hagrid's?"_

"_The one and only. There's a long story behind it, but he actually belongs to me," Harry explained._

_Rebecca blinked at that. "You sure that you don't want to become a Magizoologist?"_

_Harry laughed. "I think I'll leave the naturalist stuff to you and Luna. Give me a Dark wizard any day of the week. Anyways, you two ladies had better get on the train," he advised as he looked at his watch: 10:57. As Rebecca left to hop onto the Hogwarts Express, Harry and Hermione embraced, sharing one last kiss._

"_Take care," Harry whispered when they drew apart._

"_Stay safe," Hermione responded before she turned and hopped on the train, waving to him as it pulled out of the station._

The next two months had been hectic for the both of them, and their only line of communication had been through Athena.

But then, at the start of April;

_McGonagall and Remus strode briskly and purposely through the halls on their way to the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom._

– – o – – o – –

_Hermione was busily copying down notes when a knock sounded on the door._

"_Come in," Professor Braveheart called out._

"_I'm sorry to interrupt, Professor Braveheart," came McGonagall's voice. "Could I please borrow Miss Granger for a moment?"_

"_Of course."_

_Hermione stood up and dutifully followed the Headmistress out into the hallway, but when she spotted Remus, she stopped dead in her tracks, her hands flying to her mouth, "No... oh Merlin... please, no..."_

_Remus gently gripped Hermione's shoulders. "Hermione _listen _to me; he's alright. He's been badly_ _hurt, but he's alive."_

"_What... what happened?"_

"_His squadron was ambushed whilst on a training run. He's at St Mungo's now."_

_Hermione turned to McGonagall. "Can I... Am I allowed to go and see him Professor?" she hesitantly asked._

"_Of course Miss Granger, I'll make sure that Miss Knight keeps notes for you."_

_With a nod of her head, Hermione turned and followed Remus._

_An hour later found Remus and Hermione stepping out of the St Mungo's fireplace. Remus silently ushered Hermione through the magical hospital to Harry's room where Tonks was keeping vigil as a healer attended to her unconscious boyfriend. Hermione approached Tonks and her eyes pricked with tears as she saw the slash-like wound on Harry's back, starting on his right shoulder and ending at his left hip._

_Tonks put a reassuring hand on her shoulder before addressing the healer, "Manmalis?" The healer looked up. "I'd like you to meet Hermione Granger, she's Harry's girlfriend. Hermione meet Manmalis."_

_Manmalis presented his hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Hermione."_

"_Likewise," she replied as she shook his hand before her eyes returned to Harry. "What happened?"_

"_He was hit with a __two-tiered necrotizing curse."_

_Hermione audibly sucked in a breath at the healer's answer and Manmalis looked at her. "I take it that you've heard of the curse?"_

"_We just finished covering them in our Defence Against the Dark Arts class last week," Hermione whispered as she remembered what Professor Braveheart had told them;__"_These curses are two-fold in that they eat away at the body, but they also consume the magical core of a witch or wizard._"_

"_Then you know what damage it can do?" Hermione nodded. "Thankfully, Harry has two things in running in his favour: One, he was brought in to St Mungo's not long after he'd been inflicted with the curse so we were able to halt its the toxic effects, and two, he's made it through the first twenty-four hours safely, which is often the main hurdle to these kind of recoveries. In my professional opinion, the greatest reason to hope for a full recovery is that these curses find damage to the body easier to inflict than damage to the magic. Magic is a burly thing, doesn't like to be attacked, and it fights like the devil. Considering how quickly Harry was brought in, the most damage he suffered was physical. That we can heal, with time, but if his magic had been irrevocably damaged-" _

"_-His chances of survival would have been low, and even then it would be only to live the rest of his life as a squib," Hermione finished_

"_All we can do now is wait. If you need anything, just flag one of the nurses down," the healer told the three of them before turning and leaving the room._

Two days had passed before Harry had woken up.

_Hermione lay tucked up on the cot that she had asked to be brought into the room on the first night so that she could stay by Harry's side. _

_She was just starting to drift off when she heard a soft groan come from the bed._

_In a flash she was by his side, watching as his eyes fluttered open, "'Mione?" he whispered hoarsely as his vision gradually returned to him._

"_Hey," she whispered back._

"_Where'm I?"_

"_St Mungo's. How are you feeling?"_

"_M'back hurts."_

_Hermione kissed his forehead in response. "What am I going to do with you?"_

"_Hnnnh," he responded as he closed his eyes again._

Knowing that Harry would make a full recovery with time, Hermione had happily returned to Hogwarts the following day.

A month had passed before Manmalis had seen fit to release Harry from St Mungo's with orders for the head of the Auror Department that he be placed on a two month injury leave.

"_It's a good thing that you're ahead of everyone else." Tonks teased him over a family dinner with the Lupins one evening, "By the time that you've fully recuperated, the rest of the trainees will have caught up to you."_

When he had returned to his quarters that same night, he had found a blonde-haired, brown-eyed man waiting for him.

"_Can I help you?" Harry asked the man._

"_My name is Leo Braveheart, Mr Potter. I'm the new-"_

"_-Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts," Harry finished for him._

"_How did y-No, let me guess: Miss Granger?"_

_Harry nodded his head._

"_It's because of some of the things that Miss Granger's told me that I'm here, actually."_

"_Oh?"_

"_If you're interested, I have a proposition for you."_

_Harry sat down and indicated for Braveheart to do the same. "I'm listening."_

Two days later, Harry had found himself back in the place that had become his first real home, a warm feeling shooting through him at the knowledge that he would be spending the remaining time of his injury leave here.

Once he'd settled into his room in the Staff Wing, he'd gone out into the grounds.

_Harry smiled as Hagrid's hut came into view._

_With a few hours to kill before the day's lessons ended, he had decided to come and visit the grounds-keeper. Drawing closer to the hut, Harry spotted Buckbeak and Pan lounging around near Hagrid's pumpkin patch and he made his way over to the Hippogriff. He stopped when he was a meter away from the grey beast and locked his green gaze with the Hippogriff's orange one as he bowed. Buckbeak returned the gesture immediately before he stood up and approached his master._

_Harry had just started to pat Buckbeak when Hagrid appeared behind them. "Harry? Is tha' you?"_

_Harry turned. "Hey Hagrid."_

"_What are yeh doin' here?"_

"_I'm helping Leo Braveheart with his Defence Against the Dark Arts lessons for the next couple of months whilst I'm recovering," Harry explained._

"_Hermione said tha' yeh'd been hit with a Dark curse," Hagrid said worriedly. "Yeh're doin' alrigh' now though?"_

"_I have my moments," Harry truthfully replied._

_Hagrid laughed before he turned and headed into his hut. "Come on in."_

_It was nearly dusk before the two of them left the ground-keeper's hut to head up to the Great Hall for dinner. Once they'd started to talk, it had become clear that they had a lot to catch up on. Even now, as they made their way up into the castle, they were still chatting away. It was only as they approached the Hall that they stopped, mainly because Harry had just ducked behind Hagrid._

_Hagrid furrowed his eyebrows, "Wha' are yeh doin' Harry?"_

"_I want to surprise Hermione," Harry explained._

_With a smile, Hagrid moved off, walking between the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables. Harry shadowed his movements until he saw Hermione, who was currently facing away him, as she spoke to Rebecca about something as they waited for dinner to appear._

"_Can I join you?" he asked the two girls and then watched with a grin as Hermione realised just _who_ was standing behind her._

"_Harry!" she exclaimed as she turned to face him, the excitement caused by his presence lighting up her chocolate brown eyes. "What are you doing here?" she asked as she stood up and wrapped him in a hug. Harry tensed up the moment she pressed her arms against the still healing scar on his back._

_Realizing what she'd done, Hermione dropped her arms in a flash. "I'm sorry!"_

_Harry pressed a kiss to her forehead, "Don't worry. It's not nearly as tender as it was a month ago."_

_At the show of affection between Harry and Hermione, whispers broke out throughout the Great Hall and Harry inwardly chuckled. Hermione had told him in one of her letters not long after they'd gotten together, that when the news of Harry Potter and Hermione Granger becoming a couple had first surfaced, it had spread like wildfire throughout the student community. Their conversation was halted by the evening meal as it appeared on the table. Taking a seat by Hermione, Harry happily tucked into the food before him._

"_So, what are you doing here?" Hermione again questioned after a few minutes._

"_I'll be helping Braveheart with his lessons for the next two months."_

"_You're on injury leave?"_

"_Mmmhmm. Hey Ginny," Harry greeted the youngest Weasley as she plonked herself down on the seat opposite him._

"_Hey Harry," she greeted him half-heartedly as she began to eat, clearly in deep thought. But then after a moment, "_Harry!"_ she exclaimed, looking at him with renewed vigour. "Our Seeker; Rowan Steele, had an accident in her Defence Against the Dark Arts class a couple of days ago and lost all the bones in her leg," Harry pulled a face as he was reminded of that second year Quidditch match when, at the hands of Lockheart, he had suffered a similar fate, "Her leg's all healed now, but Pomfrey told her no high-impact activities for the next two weeks and we've got a match with Ravenclaw coming up next weekend. Would you be interested in taking in her place?"_

_Harry opened his mouth to respond with an emphatic yes, but then that all too familiar Hermione-sounding voice whispered something in his mind, "I'd love to Gin, but I'm not a student anymore, and only students can play in their house teams."_

_Ginny chewed on her lip thoughtfully before speaking, "What if I talked to McGonagall and explained our situation?"_

"_I would if she said that I could."_

_Ginny immediately stood and strode up to the Staff table._

_Harry had just loaded up his fork when a voice spoke up from behind him, "Harry, m'boy!"_

_Harry turned, mindful of his back, to face the Potions Master. "Hello, Professor."_

"_Leo told me that you'd be helping in his lessons for the next couple of months. I don't suppose that you'd be interested in helping me in a few of my Potions lessons as well?" Slughorn queried._

"_So long as we balance things out, I don't see why not," Harry responded._

"_Good," Slughorn beamed before continuing on his way, "Good evening, Miss Weasley," he addressed Ginny as they crossed paths; the Gryffindor Quidditch Captain returned the salutation, "Good evening, Professor."_

_When Ginny sat back down, Harry didn't need to ask what McGonagall's answer had been, the Cheshire grin that was plastered on her face told him everything that he needed to know._

'It's a good thing that it's the weekend tomorrow,_' he thought before speaking aloud, "I take it that I've got to make a trip to Diagon Alley in the morning?"_

Harry had risen early the following morning, and after having a quick breakfast in a relatively empty Great Hall, he left Hogwarts' grounds before he Apparated to Diagon Ally.

"_I can't believe," Hermione began as she met him in the Entrance Courtyard shortly after one o'clock, "that it's taken you _half_ a day to purchase a single broomstick!"_

_Harry tenderly kissed her before responding, "It wasn't just my broomstick that I needed to replace, 'Mione. I had to replace my Quidditch robes and protective gear as well."_

"_Your Quidditch robes?" she repeated with a furrowed brow._

"_I left my original gear at Privet Drive when we set out on the Horcrux hunt," he explained, "And I'm pretty sure that the only thing left of them now is a few scattered ashes."_

"_But if the Dursleys still detest anything to do with magic. Why did they, or at least Dudley, respond to your Christmas card?"_

"_Because I addressed it and sent it in the Muggle way and then told Athena to wait in Privet Drive for a day or so to see if there was a response. Has lunch been served?"_

"_It has."_

"_Good, 'cause I'm starving!"_

_Laughing, Hermione took his parcels from him, leaving Harry to carry his new broomstick._

_The moment that Harry stepped into the Great Hall, whispers followed him as he walked with Hermione to their usual spot at the Gryffindor table;_

"_Look at Potter's new broomstick!"_

"_That's the Firebolt Nova!"_

"No way!_"_

"_It's capable of going from naught to two hundred miles per hour in eight point five seconds!"_

"_Not to mention its reaction time is much quicker and sharper that its predecessor."_

_But as curious as the students were about the broomstick, they stayed away and let Harry eat his meal in peace, much to his relief._

_After lunch, Harry took his broomstick and parcels to his room to unwrap and hang up the scarlet robes along with everything else before leaving the room and heading to the arranged meeting point._

"Meet me at the Library when you're done," Hermione told him before they parted ways. "I've got something that I want to show you,"

_He found Hermione at her favourite table, tapping her quill, another Christmas gift from Rebecca as it was one of Pan's feathers, on a piece of parchment, clearly wrapped up in her thoughts. Taking a seat beside her, he reached over and tucked a straying lock of hair behind her ear, effectively bring her back to the present. "Galleon for your thoughts?" he questioned softly._

"_I've been thinking," she started._

"_Really? Go figure," he teased and Hermione whacked him with one of her textbooks. "Sorry. What were you saying?"_

"_We started doing human transformation in Transfiguration six weeks ago and it got me thinking, especially after you were ambushed. Harry, have you ever considered becoming an Animagus?"_

_Harry blinked at that._

_Become an Animagus? He had never really given it much thought. _

_He knew that it was a very hard feat to manage, so difficult that few had mastered the skill. It was most definitely advanced spell-work. But he'd be lying if he said that it didn't have a certain allure. His father and godfather had both been unregistered Animagi. He'd always felt a certain pride in his father's ability to become a stag. But he'd never thought of trying to do it himself. _

_Could he even do it?_

_Hermione continued on, "I know you're a skilled and powerful wizard, but what if the time came that you found yourself in a tight spot? Worse than what happen to you this time? Having something to fall back on, offensive or defensive, would be really useful. And look at Sirius. Because of his canine form he was able to slip past the Dementors and escape from Azkaban. Whatever animal form you took, it would be sure to have some ability superior to any humans'. Breathe underwater, run faster, jump higher, maybe even fly! Who knows, but anything to give you an edge; an advantage in any shape or form."_

"_It sounds like a good idea," he told her. "I just have one request, though."_

"_What's that?"_

"_That you become an Animagus as well."_

_Hermione was stunned, "Me? I-I don't know..."_

"_At least say that you'll think about it?"_

_Hermione relented. "Alright."_

"_Good. Now, what have you found?"_

_Hermione opened the book before her and began to read from it, __"_The first step to becoming an Animagus, and by far the longest and most difficult in the multi-step process, is the retraining of the brain to connect with the natural world. This preliminary step is where most witches and wizards attempting the transformation fail. To truly harmonize oneself with their animal form, a witch or wizard must wilfully and consciously abandon part of themselves to their animal instincts. Only when tokens of this union with the world transcending human experience are fully connected to the witch or wizard seeking form beyond human can one transition from the human shape of witch or wizard to the adopted form of beast. Here too lie complications, for even if one has the mental discipline to adjust their thinking, many witches and wizards are inherently incapable of accepting that they have an animal counterpart woven into their magical psychological profile. If one cannot surrender to the idea of possessing animal qualities they will never succeed in physically transforming into that animal shape._"_

_Harry looked pensive. "Okay."_

"_I've been thinking about what they mean by 'retraining the brain', and I think it could mean meditation."_

"_Meditation? Like, yoga?"_

_Hermione smiled. "Something like that, yes. In the Muggle world there are alternative medicine theories as well as religious subgroups that suggest meditation to do very much the same thing, get in touch with nature, and transcend human consciousness. I think that kind of approach is what this book suggests is necessary for the first step."_

"_What about tokens? What does that mean?"_

_Hermione looked down at the book and played with the edge of the page. "Maybe we're supposed to gather bits of the natural world. Perhaps we're meant to collect as many pieces of nature as we can, you know, as many kinds of grass, or types or leaves, or bits of animal hair from as many species we can, feathers... I don't know, but those would be 'tokens', don't you think?"_

_Harry rubbed the back of his neck. "Maybe we should ask McGonagall about it?" he suggested._

_Hermione brightened at that, "Harry, you're a genius!" she exclaimed before leaning in to kiss him. Behind them, someone wolf-whistled, but stopped when Madame Pince grabbed the offender by the ear and dragged them out of the Library. "Owowowowow."_

_When they drew apart, Hermione spoke, albeit a bit breathily, "Why don't we go and see her in the morning?"_

"_Sounds like a plan."_

That evening, after dinner, the Gryffindor Quidditch team had headed to the Quidditch Pitch for practice and Harry had relished the feeling of being in the air once again.

When practice had finished, Harry had followed the team back up to Gryffindor Tower.

"_Knight's Honour,_" _Ginny spoke the password to the Fat Lady and the portrait swung open._

_As the team clamoured through the portrait hole, Harry saw Hermione curled up on the lounge in front of the fire, engrossed in her homework._

_She looked up as he took a seat beside her. "Hey."_

"_Hey. Need any help?"_

_In answer, she closed her books and packed away her quill and parchment before snuggling into him. He responded by curling his arms around her and resting his chin on the top of her head. They remained that way for a few minutes before Harry spoke up, "Have you given the becoming an Animagus idea any further thought?"_

_Hermione sighed before pulling back, "I don't think I'm-"_

"_If it's a question of magical prowess, you're just as capable as I am, 'Mione," he cut her off, "My talent may lie in Defence Against the Dark Arts, but overall, _you_ are the strongest one out of the two of us." Harry sighed and ran a hand through his already unkempt hair. "The only reason that I'm pushing this is because if something were to happen to you, I'd never be able to forgive myself."_

_Hermione hugged him, understanding his concern. "Alright, I'll do it."  
_

The next morning, after breakfast, they headed to the Headmistress' office.

_Harry knocked on the door, and after McGonagall called for them to enter, opened it before stepping aside to let Hermione enter first._

"_Harry, Miss Granger," McGonagall greeted them as they took a seat in front of her desk. "How can I help you?"_

"_Professor, Harry and I are interested in becoming Animagi. I checked this book out of the Library," Hermione showed McGonagall the book. "There's an extensive chapter on Animagi in it, but we wanted to ask you some questions about the process, seeing as you've been through it."_

_The Headmistress regarded the couple for a moment before saying: "What do you want to know?"_

"_From what we've read, Hermione thinks," Harry spoke, "that to 'retrain one's thinking' refers to meditation of some kind, trying to get in touch with nature. And she thinks 'tokens' means we're to collect things, like leaves and feathers."_

_McGonagall looked proudly at Hermione. "You are right, Miss Granger. For the first phase of the process, you have to tap into the magical imprint inside everything in nature. You have to retrain your brain to reach the magic of something, know its magic, connect with it, and then it becomes your token," Hermione nodded her head in understanding, "But this is where most witches and wizards fail because they think like a human too much. You have to retrain your brain, learn to find the magic in everything, but not everything's magic can be your token. Take a leaf for example. Every leaf has magic, part of the living essence of the tree. One leaf won't token to you, but maybe another will. You can't take a token that's not yours and you can't ignore one that picks you. Collect what is yours for the final incantation, but _only_ yours. If it's not your token, it will sour the spell. Many witches and wizards try to force their tokens, and that's not natural. A wizard thinks that a rock should be a token, because rocks are nature, so he takes it, but it didn't token itself to him, so he thought like a human and the animal within him doesn't like that. It won't join with him for lies. Your animal won't join with you if you try to trick it."_

"_Honesty, fidelity," Hermione mused._

_McGonagall beamed. "Exactly, Miss Granger."_

"_And how do we meditate to reach this magic?" Harry asked._

"_I cannot teach you how, but I can tell you what you need to do. You have to stop thinking like a human. Be part of the leaves, be the magic in you that connects to the magic in the leaves."_

_It was a baffling riddle to Harry, but Hermione was relieved. "Thank you so much, Professor. We'll work really hard, but we won't think really hard."_

_McGonagall nodded her head, "You understand what you've got to do, Miss Granger. I expected nothing less of you."_

"_Well, I'm glad someone does," Harry mumbled._

_Hermione looked at him. "Oh, you'll do it, Harry. It's about gut instinct, if I understand what Professor McGonagall has told us correctly, and you're very good at going on instinct." When Harry shook his head, still not understanding, she tried another angle, "Think of it this way. When you're catching the Snitch, how much are you actually_ thinking_?"_

_Harry blinked and the first whisper of understanding shot through him. "Hardly at all."_

"_Exactly. You need to stop thinking." Hermione turned back to the Headmistress. "What's the second phase, Professor?"_

"_The second phase is a potion to bind the token magic to the witch or wizard. The individual magic of each object is only sporadically connected to the greater magical energy in nature... the way your tokens jump out at you in flashes and you don't feel them all the time. You need to bind them together and to yourselves. There is also spell you'll have to learn before your first attempt."_

_Harry scowled at this._

"_Honestly, Harry!" Hermione chided her boyfriend. "Did you think you'd manage an accomplishment such as this without some work?"_

"_Hoped so," Harry corrected._

"_You won't be able to try the actual spell for the first transformation until the first full moon." McGonagall spoke, returning the two teen's attention to her._

"_Why a full moon?" Harry questioned_

"_The lunar cycle has a very powerful influence on animals. Your inner animals will be more easily awakened under a full moon."_

"_Are we supposed to have a certain number of tokens to do it?" Hermione asked._

"_The more the better, but it cannot be done with less than five. You have to be able to form a pentagram with the objects. __You will also need to register at the __Ministry of Magic__ before you start," McGonagall told them._

"_I'll send word to the __Improper Use of Magic Office__ today," Harry assured the once-Transfiguration teacher._

_McGonagall nodded, "Is there anything else that you wish to know?"_

_The teens shook their heads__ before standing and making their way to the door._

"_One more thing," McGonagall spoke as Harry opened the door, "make sure that you take care in your Quidditch practice and match, Harry. The last thing we want is for you to be reinjured."_

"_I'll be diligent, Professor; I promise you that," Harry assured her._

"_Very well."_

_Once they'd left McGonagall's office, Harry and Hermione returned to Gryffindor Tower to grab some parchment, a quill and a bottle of ink before heading for the Owlery._

_They were just heading along one of the corridors when Peeves suddenly burst from one of the walls ahead of them. The couple stopped immediately and Harry tensed when the poltergeist spotted them, waiting for the mischievous ghost's latest prank. But nothing came. _

_Instead, he started singing:_

~We did it, we bashed them, wee Potter's the One

And Voldy's gone mouldy, so now let's have fun~

_Once he'd finished, Peeves took off down the corridor._

_Hermione furrowed her brow as she watched the poltergeist go. "Why would he still be..." she trailed off._

"_Hermione?" Harry questioned, touching her arm with concern._

_She surprised him by suddenly wrapping him up in hug. "It's been a year," she whispered fervently into his neck. "One _whole_ year since you defeated Voldemort."_

_They stood there in the loving embrace for what seemed to be hours, before remembering that they had something to do. _

_Letting go of one another, they continued on their way_

_The Owlery was as it usually was: noisy._

_As Harry went to find Athena, Hermione penned the letter to the Head of the Improper Use of Magic Office. __When Harry returned with Athena perched on his arm, they attached the letter to her leg and sent the barn owl on her way._

– – o – – o – –

_Dinner that evening was part celebration, made even more special by the fact that Harry was among them._

TBC...

51


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Notes:**

Thanks go to my Beta: Blueglaceon.

Thanks also go to MissAnnThropic, who has allowed me to borrow ideas and exerts from her brilliant story _Vox Corporis_.

And ya'll know the rap; Harry Potter doesn't belong to me.

Rebecca Knight, Pan and Athena and every other character that you haven't heard of do, so no touchies without permission.

**Chapter 3**

The next few days had flown by for Harry.

Between Defence Against the Dark Arts and Potions lessons, daily visits to Madame Pomfrey for treatment and Quidditch practice - which the Hospital matron had been none too pleased about when she'd found out about Harry's plans - he'd been flat strap. The only peaceful times he'd had were his and Hermione's meditation sessions, which they'd started once they'd filled out the registration forms that Mafalda Hopkirk, the Head of the Improper Use of Magic Office, had sent them and they had gotten the all clear from the Ministry of Magic.

Their first few sessions had, expectedly, yielded no results.

But then, one sunny Tuesday afternoon:

_It came with a leaf, fallen from the treetop overhead. It whirled gently, like a dancer, it pirouetted and paused and fluttered and Harry knew how it would feel to dip with it. Free and flying, he could be that leaf. Countless times in his life, he had been._

_Harry, eyes closed, listened to the leaf land on the ground next to his ear. His wind-brother. One of the secret society of air dancers. He could see, in his mind, the uneven edges, the rich green colour, the thick smell, the length of its stem, so light and at the mercy of the wind's whims. How ready it was to roll and take flight._

_Harry gasped softly when a thought, as though not his own, slipped into his mind. '_Take this part of me.'_ In that second there was a bond, a link, a oneness that bade Harry to reclaim that part of him before it was blown in the wind and lost._

_Harry opened his eyes, jarred by the harsh light, and turned his head. The leaf lay where it had alighted, no different or better than any other, but Harry was compelled to claim that particular one. He rolled on to his side, sat up, and picked up the leaf. He stopped then to let thought return. He stared at the leaf in his hand and wondered, had he just taken a token? Was this what it felt like? Or did he merely think it could be, when perhaps he'd just had a silly moment when he'd been fascinated by a stupid leaf?_

"_Harry?"_

_Hermione's voice, gentle and dream-like, drew his eyes. He looked down at where she lay on the ground beside him. She was gazing up at him, expression sleepy and content, her hair spilling around her head and glinting honey-gold in places. _

_Thought came crashing back with a vengeance. _

_He looked a little foolishly at the leaf in his hand. Hermione's eyes followed his and he saw the blissful, untroubled peace of a session leave her face, replaced by astute and intellectual Hermione._

"_Oh! Did you... is that...?"_

_Harry shrugged. "I... don't know. I was just lying there, and then I thought, well, kind of dumb what I thought, and then I just had this feeling like I had to take it..." Harry twirled the ordinary leaf between his fingers by the stem and shook his head. "You know, it's probably not, I'm sure it was just..."_

_Hermione sat up quickly. "No! Don't think on it, keep it. I'll bet you anything that it's a token, Harry. What did it feel like?"_

_Harry struggled to recapture the transient, amorphous feeling that had driven him to snatch up a regular leaf. "Um... like, for a second there, it was a bit like this was..." Harry felt stupid, "part of me."_

_Hermione was grinning. "I'm sure you've done it, Harry!"_

It had seemed that the token process of becoming an Animagus was most difficult on the first token. Once they had known what it felt like, and how they were to get there, it had become much easier.

But the next day:

"_Settle down, settle down," Braveheart called to his seventh year class as he entered the classroom. _

_Hermione smiled as she saw Harry follow the Professor into the classroom and stand off to the side as Braveheart addressed the class, "As you're all aware, Professor Potter will be helping me over the next couple of months. I expect you to show him nothing but your _upmost_ respect." At this, Braveheart shot the snickering Slytherins a withering glare and they hushed under the ex-Auror's gaze. "Understood?"_

_The class nodded._

"_Good. Now, time for a little revision. You all remember the Body Maiming curses that we finished covering a month ago?" the class nodded. "Professor Potter, being the trouble attracting fellow that he is, has been stuck by two of these curses and I want to see if you can recognise which ones from the scars that they've left on his body. Harry, if you will."_

_Harry, grateful that Braveheart had warned him of what he was going to ask of him, turned away from the class and removed his cloak, jumper and shirt. Once he had bared his upper body the class he paused to allow them to get a good look at the scar on his back._

_As he was turning around to face the class, a wolf-whistle broke the air._

"_Thank-you, Miss Weasley," Braveheart scolded the young Gryffindor woman._

_Harry looked at Ginny, who winked at him and then subtly ticked her head at Hermione, before, "Sorry, sir."_

_As Harry looked to his girlfriend, he could see the blush on her cheeks as she greedily raked her eyes over him as if she were seeing him in a new light. _

– – o – – o – –

_Hermione knew that Harry had always been lean of build, but with six years of Quidditch under his belt and the rigorous Auror training, his chest and abdomen had become quiet sculpted. _

'Merlin, he's a vision,_' she thought as she felt desire shoot through her._

_Braveheart brought Hermione from her thoughts. "Yes, Miss Weasley?"_

"_The scars on his chest are from __Sectumsempra__. You can tell by the fact that the hair in and around the scarred flesh," she referred to the light dusting of hair that covered Harry's chest, "hasn't grown back."_

"_Excellent. Five points to Gryffindor." _

_Hermione raised her hand._

"_Miss Granger?"_

"_It's hard to recognize because there isn't much damage, but the scar on Harry's back is from a __two-tiered necrotizing curse. The lack of damage is because he was taken to St Mungo's shortly after he was hit with the curse, so the spell was neutralised before it could do any serious harm."_

"_Outstanding Miss Granger, as always. Ten points to Gryffindor. Now..."_

_As Braveheart started the day's lesson, Harry again turned away from the class and pulled his shirt and jumper back on. When he turned back around he found Hermione staring at him, desire clear in her brown gaze. When Hermione realized that Harry was looking at her, she snapped out of her trance and busied herself with copying down notes, a furious blush appearing on her features._

_Harry smirked, but then his Seeker honed eyes drew his attention to the back of the class where one of the girls was passing a note to another, who opened it, read it, added something to it before folding the piece of parchment up and passing it on to the next girl. All lesson this was repeated until it was time to pack up, where, because he had to get to a fourth year Potions lesson, he had to leave straight away and therefore didn't see that the note was slipped into Hermione's Defence Against the Dark Arts textbook._

_It wasn't until she got to the Great Hall to spend her free period studying that Hermione found the note when she opened the textbook that it had been in. _

_Opening it, she began to read. At first she felt indignation and a little disgust at each girl's explicit descriptions of what they'd do to Harry were they the ones dating him. But as she read the second half of the note, her anger was replaced by sadness._

'I think that Granger's faking being with Potter.'

'You can say that again. Miss perfect prudish Hermione Granger would have to _pretend_ to have an interest in boys, let alone Harry Potter.'

'She'd never have a boy's hand up her skirt because she'd beat them to death with a book as soon as they looked at her.'

'I think she's using him as a shield, because most people seemed to think Potter is something special and wouldn't think to approach her if they believed he would have a problem with it.'

'She's not even pretty enough to be able to go out with him.'

'You've got a point! Maybe that's why she dated Weasley, the ugliest guy in the school!'

'I bet Potter's unsatisfied with her. He's probably cheating on her with some other girl just to satisfy his needs.'

'I know _I_ could.'

_Hermione packed up her gear and left the Great Hall._

– – o – – o – –

_Harry let out an agitated breath as he continued to pace underneath their favourite tree by the Black Lake._

'Where is she? She's never missed one of our sessions before!_'_

_He hadn't been too concerned when Hermione hadn't turned up for lunch, chalking it up to the fact that she was probably studying in the Library and lost track of the time, after all, it wasn't the first time that it had happened. But when she hadn't shown up for their afternoon meditation, he _had_ started to become worried._

'Fifteen minutes,_' he told himself. '_Fifteen minutes and then I'll go and look for her._'_

– – o – – o – –

_Hermione watched Harry from one of the castle's windows for a few moments before she turned and walked away._

_Though they hadn't known it, the girl's comments had reawakened Hermione's most pressing fear and insecurity: that she would wake up one day to discover that her relationship with Harry had been nothing more than a dream. __She was, after all, just plain, old, boring Hermione Granger, and Harry had his own chapter in half the wizard books in publication. He tended to shrug those off and wince a little if he reacted at all, but it didn't change the fact that he was someone, and she was nobody._

– – o – – o – –

_Harry strode, purposely, through the castle._

_So far every place that he'd thought that Hermione might've been in: the Library, the Great Hall and a number of empty classrooms, had turned up empty. He was just heading up to the seventh floor when he spotted two familiar figures walking ahead of him and he called out to them. "Ginny! Rebecca!"_

_The two seventh year girls stopped and turned to face him. "Hey Harry," they greeted him in unison._

"_Have you two seen Hermione?" he asked when he drew level with them._

_At his question the two girls looked briefly to one another, which Harry didn't fail to see, "This is about the note in Defence Against the Dark Arts isn't it?"_

"_How did you-" Rebecca started._

"_Once a Seeker, always a Seeker," Harry stated, "I saw the note being passed around from the get-go."_

"_You're right," Ginny told him, "It_ _is about the note. If you tracked its movement, you would have seen that it wasn't passed to Rebecca and me, but from what we overheard on our way out, it was about Hermione. We saw one of the Slytherins slip it into her textbook as she packed up, just after you'd left."_

_Harry ran a hand through his hair. "And you two haven't seen her since?"_

_Rebecca and Ginny shook their heads._

"_Thanks," Harry told them before turning and heading back the way that he had come from._

"_Where are you going now?" Ginny called after him._

"_To consult the Marauder's Map," Harry called back._

"_Marauder's Map?" Rebecca repeated, looking at Ginny after Harry had disappeared from sight._

"_When Harry's father was at school, he and his three friends, who called themselves the Marauders, created a map of Hogwarts that shows you where everyone in the castle is and what they're doing at anytime of the day or night," Ginny explained._

"Everyone?_" Rebecca repeated._

"_Everyone," Ginny confirmed._

_A grin appeared on Rebecca features. "Wicked!"_

– – o – – o – –

_Harry entered his room and strode over to the desk. Opening the draw, he withdrew the innocent looking piece of parchment and tapped it with his wand. "_I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." _Harry watched as the map appeared before his eyes and once it was completed, scanned it until he had found the label entitled 'Hermione Granger' on the seventh floor._ _'_She's on her way to the Room of Requirement,_' he realised as he saw the footsteps disappear off the map. "_Mischief managed._"_

_Ten minutes later he found himself in front of the all too familiar section of wall that transformed into the door to the Room of Requirement._

'Hermione's probably come here so that she can study in peace. Away from those **vipers**,_' he thought venomously._ _Bringing himself from his grim thoughts, Harry paced along the patch of wall three times whilst thinking, '_I need a place to study... I need a place to study... I need a place to study.'

_When he finished his pacing, a door had appeared before him. Opening it as quietly as he could, he stepped through. He spotted Hermione at the far end of the room, seated at a table, books spread out before her, busily writing away. As silently as he could, he approached her and took a seat beside her before placing a hand over her trembling one. Hermione stopped writing and looked at him for a moment before she buried herself into his waiting arms, and as Harry began to soothingly rub her back, sobs shook her small frame._

"_How can people be so mean?" she asked in a near-whisper._

_Harry pressed a kiss to her forehead. "That's human nature, I'm afraid."_

_After a few minutes of silence and comfort from her boyfriend, Hermione began to calm down._

"_Is that the note?" he asked, referring to the crumpled piece of parchment that sat on the table, Hermione nodded her head against his chest and Harry withdrew his wand. "_Wingardium Leviosa. Incendio."

_The parchment rose into the air and then caught aflame. __The couple watched it burn in silence for a few moments before Hermione, unexpectedly, spoke up, "I'm scared, Harry."_

_Harry drew back from her a bit. "About what?"_

"_I'm afraid that I'll wake up one day and find that this, us, has all been a figment of my imagination."_

"_Is this what the note was about?"_

"_Part of," she responded with a slight blush._

_Without another word, Harry suddenly swooped down to kiss his girlfriend soundly. When they drew apart, he took Hermione's hand and placed it over his rapidly beating heart. "Does this feel like a figment of your imagination to you?" Hermione shook her head. "I love you Hermione Jean Granger, have done since fifth year. Nothing will ever change that fact, you hear me? _Nothing."

_Hermione buried herself back into Harry's embrace, her fears resolved._

"_C'mon," Harry spoke up after a few minutes of comfortable silence, "I think a meditation session is in order."_

_Fifteen minutes later, Harry and Hermione were lounging under their tree by the Black Lake, deep in meditation._

_He was the place between the tree and between the water, the being atop the grass, and under the leaves, the creature that lounged with another at his side... another with lustrous, wild brown hair that fluttered in the breeze, that danced around her face, ticked his skin, teased his senses, called to his fingers. _

_Called to him._

_Harry turned to Hermione, her hair loose and free, and blinked._

_Hermione looked at him. "What?"_

_Harry considered her a moment, as he slipped the scissors that he had started to carry with him when they'd started the token process from his belt loop, and sat up. Hermione looked at them in confusion and then up into his eyes._

_Harry brought up his free hand and caught a segment of her eternally untamed hair. "May I?"_

_Hermione's eyes widened when she understood and she nodded. Harry cut off a lock of hair and came away with his token. _

_He studied the brown-gold collection of hairs, rolled them between his fingers in wonder at the softness, the Hermioneness in their magic, the magic imprint singing true of his girlfriend. _

_He opened the moleskin pouch around his neck, adding his newest prize to his already five strong token collection, before looking to Hermione. She seemed astounded, strangely honoured, to have been chosen. She reached up and ran her fingers through her hair as though to find where the place he'd taken his token from her._

_When the first stars appeared in the sky, Harry and Hermione made their way inside to the Great Hall for dinner. But as Hermione went to take a seat in their usual place along the Gryffindor table, Harry caught her arm and stopped her._

"_What are you doing?" she asked him as he closed the distance between them, stopping when his face just inches from hers._

"_Showing those vipers that you and I are anything_ but_ fake," he replied huskily before claiming her lips in a searing kiss._

_When they drew apart in what felt like several sunlit days later, it was to wolf-whistles and cat-calls from the other students. Hermione, still a bit dazed from the intensity of Harry's kiss, clung to her boyfriend until she was sure that she could stand on her own two feet._

After dinner they had parted ways; Hermione to Gryffindor Tower to catch up on the work that she had missed and its corresponding homework and Harry to his room to do his own Auror homework.

An hour had passed when he heard a knock on his door.

"_Come in," he called, not turning to look at the door._

"_Harry, m'boy," came Slughorn's voice from the doorway. "Miss Granger is here to see you."_

_Harry turned, a little too quickly, to look at the door, and his body reminded him that he was still healing with a sharp jab of pain. Harry stifled his cry, but Hermione must have seen him tense up, because she was by his side in an instant._

"_Are you alright?" she questioned as she looked at him with worry laced eyes as she soothingly rubbed his back._

"_I'm fine. It was just a twinge."_

_She shot him a look that clearly said '_I don't believe you._'_

"_I'm _fine_," he assured her._

_Hermione relented and looked to Slughorn. "Thank you for escorting me here, Professor."_

"_Don't mention it, Miss Granger. Although, now that I have the both of you here," at this Slughorn shut the door, "I heard from Minerva that the two of you are going to attempt to become Animagi."_

"_We've already started the token process," Harry told the Potions Master as he got to his feet and stood beside Hermione._

"_Excellent! Then you've no doubt heard that there's a bit of potion work involved?"_

_The two teens nodded their heads._

"_It just so happens that I'll be covering the needed potion, which is a fairly complicated one, with the seventh year class in the next few weeks_."

"_It'll be good to know what goes in to making the potion," Hermione mused._

_Slughorn was a little stunned at this. "You're not making the potion yourselves?"_

_Harry shook his head. "__Mafalda Hopkirk told us that a Ministry official would brew the potion when we were ready for our first attempt."_

"_Ah, of course. Should have known, really. Well, I'd best leave you two in peace, then," Slughorn said as he left the room._

_Once the door closed behind the Potions Master, Hermione promptly turned to Harry, sealed her mouth to his and kissed him soundly._

"_I've wanted to do that since I entered the room," she told him huskily when they drew apart a few minutes later._

– – o – – o – –

"Young love,_" Horace Slughorn mused to himself as paused outside the door for a moment before he headed to his room to retire for the night._

– – o – – o – –

"_Now, what brings you here?" Harry questioned his girlfriend._

_Hermione returned to the desk to retrieve the book she'd put down when she'd rushed to his side. "I spoke to Professor McGonagall this morning after breakfast," she said as she took out a strip of parchment and offered it to him._

_Harry took it and read one of the longest spells he'd ever seen, penned in Hermione's well-familiar hand._

"_This is the incantation we'll have to say for the change. You'll need to study it."_

_Harry glanced down at the parchment. "Couldn't I just read it over a few times then take this with me when we change?"_

_Hermione shook her head. "It needs to be learned. You have to know this off by heart, because this is the same spell, the latter half of it anyway, that will change you back. It has to be readily recalled even when your mind has become that of your Animagus form. If it's not set strongly in your mind, well... might be a spot of trouble turning into a human again. Once you've made the change the first time your body learns how to do it, you know, once it's been shown how, but the first time, each way, you have to know the incantation."_

"_Right, got it. Very important. I'll learn it."_

The rest of the week had flown by peacefully, and before they knew it, it was Saturday morning.

_A hush fell over the Great Hall when Harry appeared in the doorway, clad in his Gryffindor Quidditch attire, sans robe and protective gear, his Firebolt Nova slung over his shoulder. He spotted his team-mates, as well as Hermione and Rebecca, sitting halfway up the Gryffindor table and made his way towards them._

"_Morning all," he greeted them when he drew level with where they were sitting, not failing to spot that the team cleared a spot in the centre of the table for the prized broomstick to rest while they ate. _

_As Harry sat down beside Hermione and began to eat, Hermione finished her meal and began to fuss over him. "How's your back feeling this morning? Did you get enough sleep last night? Are you sure you want to do this? You don't have to! What if you fall and hurt yourself?"_

_Harry shushed her with a kiss._

"_I'm _fine_," he stressed the word, "and the team knows that they've got to watch my back,"_

_Hermione looked down at her plate for a moment, "I'm sorry. I just don't want to see you get hurt."_

"_I know and I'll be careful, don't worry," he assured her before tucking into his food._

"_Alright, team. Let's go!" Ginny announced, ten minutes later._

"_Good luck," Hermione said to Harry as she kissed him on the cheek._

"_Thanks."_

_Harry, now fully garbed in his Quidditch gear, made his way back into the central part of the changing room._

'Ginny chose a really good team,_' Harry mused to himself as he looked over the people before him, just like he had during their first practice. Of the team that he had chosen during his time as Captain, Ginny had kept Demelza Robbins, Jimmy Peakes and Ritchie Coote. The fresh blood she'd injected consisted of Chaser __Raine Fairweather,__ Keeper __Kristin Bane, the absent Rowan Steele and the team's __reserve Isis Leon._

_The chatter between team-mates stopped when Ginny entered the room and stood by the chalkboard, as noise from the students beginning to fill the stands wafted down into the changing room, "Alright," Ginny began to speak, "for your benefit Harry, the Ravenclaw team consist of Chasers: __Nicolas Davy, Jeremy Stretton and Randolf Burrow;__Beaters: Duncan Inglebee and Jason Samuels__; Keeper:__ Grant Page and__ Seeker: Megan Chambers." Ginny looked at each of the team in turn. "Now, I don't think I have to tell you just how important this match is or how imperative it is that we protect Harry?"_

_The team shook their heads._

'It seems that some of Hermione's Mother Henning has rubbed off onto Ginny,_' Harry mused. "Ginny!" he caught the youngest Weasley's attention, "I'm not made of glass," he told her before turning to look at Peakes and Coote. "So long as you two keep the Bludgers away from my back, I'll be fine," he told them and they nodded._

"_Well then," Ginny spoke, looking sheepishly at her former crush for a moment, "if we play the way we were during practice, we've got a one way ticket to a place in the Finals. Now, let's get moving."_

_The team picked up their broomsticks from the rack and walked out of the room and into the small tunnel leading up to the pitch, forming up into line as they went. _

_The noise coming from outside was now tremendous._

_Ahead of them the Ravenclaws were shooting out into the air. _

_The sound of Raine's sister, Dawn's magically amplified voice reverberated around the stands drifted down to them as he announced the Hufflepuff team:  
_  
"Davy! Stretton! Burrow! Inglebee! Samuels! Page! And... Chambers!"

_"Mount your brooms!" Ginny shouted. _

_"Good luck everyone," Isis spoke from her position behind Harry. _

_She was the only member not to mount up; as the team reserve she would not be flying out, merely walking a short distance to the right to sit on the reserves bench._

_One by one they shot out into the air and Dawn's voice now became more excited:_

"And here come the Gryffindors! I give you: _Fairweather__! __Weasley__! __Robbins__! __Peakes__! __Coote__! __Bane!__ And... Potter!"_

_A great roar of approval went up from the Gryffindor stand. _

_Harry zoomed out into the sea of noise and did a lap of the stands, relishing the feeling flying always gave him, wind whipping at his face and his robes flapping out behind him. _

_The stands were all packed: there were solid blocks of scarlet and blue at each end where the Gryffindor and Ravenclaws were seated, to his left was the Hufflepuff stand where there seemed to be an even mix of blue and scarlet rosettes and banners. To his right was another solid block of blue - the Slytherins, whom he had no doubt were only doing it because they wanted to see Gryffindor lose. They hissed loudly as he shot past them, heading for the Gryffindor stand. Hagrid was towering over them all as usual and he waved as Harry approached; Harry grinned and waved back, and then his heart skipped a beat as he caught sight of Hermione, Gryffindor scarf around her neck, waving to him and cheering like mad. _

_It was very tempting to swoop down for a kiss..._

_'_Mind on the game, Potter,_'__ he thought._

_"Our reserve players today are Horus Leon for Hufflepuff and his sister Isis Leon for Gryffindor," Dawn announced. "Go get 'em Raine!"_

"You will refrain from personal comments, Fairweather," McGonagall scolded Dawn, standing at her usual position to the right of Dawn.

"Hey no problems, Professor," said Dawn, and then spoke back into her magical microphone. "The game is about to begin! Here comes Madame Hooch with the balls!"  
  
_Madame Hooch was striding out to the centre of the pitch in her black-and-white referee's robes, a large crate under one arm. _

_The Ravenclaws, all in their blue robes, hovered in a loose semicircle not far from the ground; the Gryffindors took up station opposite them, Peakes and Coote twirling their Beater's bats around trying to intimidate the younger Ravenclaw Beaters. _

_Ginny and Nicolas Davy flew down to Madame Hooch and shook hands with each other._

"I'm expecting a nice clean game," Madame Hooch warned them all before opening the crate. 

_The Golden Snitch shot out, dancing around them for a moment before shooting off and disappearing from sight. With their trademark cackling sound the two Bludgers rocketed skywards, and then in one smooth motion Madame Hooch launched the Quaffle into the air and blew her whistle.  
_  
_"And we're off!" cried Dawn._

All fourteen players shot into the sky, _Kristin__ and __Grant Page__ immediately streaking back to their goalposts. _

_The noise level swelled.  
_  
_"And it's Ginny Weasley of Gryffindor with the Quaffle!" said Dawn. "Weasley is away now, she passes to Robbins on her right, Demelza Robbins now with the Quaffle... ouch, nice interception there by Randolf Burrow of Ravenclaw, Burrow now with the Quaffle - passes to Stretton - a quick pass to Davy, very nice, and it's Nicolas Davy now approaching the goals - Davy gets hit by Bludger from Jimmy Peakes, nice shot Peakes, Davy has dropped the Quaffle and now it's Fairweather, __Raine Fairweather__ of Gryffindor streaking up the pitch now..."  
_  
_Harry was zooming along the left hand side of the pitch, scouring around for the Snitch. He was doing his best to keep one ear on Dawn's commentary and risking quick glances at the action itself; they were barely a minute into the game and already it was frantic, the Quaffle going back and forth between each team regularly.  
_  
_"And Fairweather is flying... dodges a Bludger from Jason Samuels... a quick pass to Demelza Robbins... Robbins now with the Quaffle, avoids Davy, reverse passes to Weasley..."_

Dawn's voice now grew more excited.

"And it's Ginny Weasley approaching the scoring area! She's only got the Keeper to beat! Come on Ginny!"

"You have been warned, Fairweather!"

"Sorry, Professor!"

Grant Page dived; the Quaffle soared through his right goal hoop and a great cheer went up from the Gryffindor end as the bell rang.

"Weasley scores! It's ten-nil to Gryffindor! Page passes the Quaffle out to Davy and we're underway again!"

Harry raised his fist in the air in celebration.

"Watch it Harry!" yelled Coote.

Harry turned - a Bludger was rocketing towards him. He dived and just in time; he felt it streak just over the top of his head, and then with a thwack_ Coote sent it streaking back towards Duncan Inglebee ._

"Cheers Coote!" Harry shouted.

"No problem," shouted Coote, keeping track on the Bludger shooting towards Inglebee. "Oh, going to hit it at Demelza are you? I don't think so!"  
  
_He was off. _

_Harry nudged his Firebolt Nova into action and flew high, looping around the stands and gazing around for any glimmer of gold. He could see Ravenclaw's Seeker, Megan, flying high on his opposite side. _

_She didn't seem to be having much luck either. _

_Dawn's commentary continued: "Davey has recovered the Quaffle from Weasley, bit of a sneaky move if you ask me-"  
_  
_"Fairweather!"  
_  
_"-and now he passes to Stretton, Jeremy Stretton with the Quaffle, he ducks a Bludger, he's going to be intercepted by __Raine Fairweather__... Okay, he's not... Still Stretton now with the Quaffle, all the other Chasers are behind him; he's only got Gryffindor Keeper Kristin Bane to beat..."_

The bell rang again, and a great cheer went up from the Ravenclaw stand.

"Stretton scores," Dawn said, not sounding as happy about it as when Ginny had. "Ten all."

Kristin swooped down and grabbed the Quaffle, passing it to Demelza.  
  
_"Demelza Robbins now for Gryffindor, passes to Weasley. Ouch, nice Bludger from Samuels, Burrow now with the Quaffle, passes Robbins, intercepted by Fairweather, Raine Fairweather now for Gryffindor..."_

The action continued for another fast-paced quarter of an hour; Gryffindor scored twice more with goals from Raine and Demelza, but the Hufflepuff Keeper saved two more attempts from Ginny. Kristin had saved one and lost one. 

_"It's thirty-twenty now and this game is really starting to pick up," Dawn commentated. "Weasley for Gryffindor has the Quaffle, and she's really moving!"_

Harry was now streaking low over the turf, looking around frantically for any sign of the Snitch. Shadows from the players above him shot past in all directions; there were shouts, the occasional cackling sound of a Bludger, the roar of the crowd...

He turned and began shooting back down towards the Gryffindor goals, just as above him Jeremy Stretton was again bearing down on Kristin.

"Stretton's beaten his way through again!" cried Dawn. "Come on Kristin, you can do it!"

Harry looked up at the fast-approaching Kristin; Kristin saw him coming and at the sight of Harry, or more accurately; his broomstick, she turned back to the approaching Jeremy with a look of determination on her face.

"And what a save!" yelled Dawn. "Fantastic save by Kristin Bane, who sends the Quaffle straight back out to Raine Fairweather!"

A great cheer went up from the Gryffindors. 

_Harry pulled around and headed back down towards the Ravenclaw end, growing frustrated. Where was the Snitch?_

"Is that the Snitch?" came Dawn's amplified voice. 

_Harry was just pulling around from the Ravenclaw hoops when a flash of blue shot past him - Megan Chambers. He saw a twinkle of gold fluttering ahead of her and he cursed, urging his Firebolt Nova forward._

"It is the Snitch! Megan Chambers is hot on its tail and so is Harry Potter, wow, this should be interesting..."  
  
_The Snitch shot straight into the mass of approaching Quidditch players. _

_Both Harry and Megan were forced to duck and swerve wildly as they followed the Snitch into the oncoming action: Demelza shot past on Harry's right, clutching the Quaffle... Megan ducked under Davy... Harry barely managed to swerve past Ginny... The crowd was roaring with approval... still the Snitch danced away ahead of them, nimbly but erratically picking its way through the action... A Bludger came rocketing straight at Harry and he instinctively went into a Sloth Grip Roll, hanging upside down on his broom and feeling the Bludger graze past his knuckles... up ahead Megan was forced to veer wildly to her right to avoid flying into Duncan Inglebee..._

It was what Harry needed. He put on an extra burst of speed and shot past Megan, the Snitch now only a few feet in front of him. The noise from the crowd rose; he could hear Dawn still calling out the action... Megan had pulled back and was right alongside him...  


_The Snitch suddenly dipped and changed direction, heading right back the way it had come. Harry and Megan both turned as fast as they could but it was too late, the Snitch was gone again just like that. Harry let out a frustrated cry as Megan zoomed off to the left, heading over to look by the Hufflepuff stand. At the far end the bell rang once again._

_"Goal by Ginny Weasley! Thirty all!"_

The match raged on for another ten minutes until it was brought to a nasty halt: Raine tried to avoid a Bludger sent at her by Jason Samuels but the Bludger hit the back of her broomstick, sending her veering off course and she collided with the Slytherin stand heavily. 

_The Slytherins all roared with laughter as she plummeted down and landed on her arm; Ginny called for a time-out as the Gryffindors all landed next to their injured team-mate. _

_Raine was clutching her left arm, which hung lifelessly._

"It's broken," Raine said through tears of pain. "I heard it snap."

"Madame Pomfrey for you, my girl," said Madame Hooch, landing next to her. "Off you go. Get your reserve ready, Miss Weasley."

Ginny helped Raine over to the tunnel leading to the changing rooms, where Madame Pomfrey was already waiting. Isis was standing by the reserves bench, clutching her hands to her mouth in concern.

"She'll be fine," Ginny shouted to her. "Get on your broom, Isis!"

"Looks like we're going to have a substitution," Dawn's voice rang out. "Isis Leon replaces the injured Raine Fairweather. Good game, sis."

Applause rang out from the stands in appreciation for Raine's performance, except, of course, from the Slytherins who booed loudly. 

_Madame Hooch blew her whistle and the game recommenced.  
_  
_"Burrow in possession of the Quaffle," said Dawn. "Passes to Stretton, ooh, nice Bludger there from Ritchie Coote, Stretton drops the Quaffle and now it's Ginny Weasley in possession, streaking up the pitch, wow it's like a red blur-"_

"Fairweather!"

"-that wasn't a personal comment Professor, it was just a comment, Weasley now passes to Leon, Isis Leon for Gryffindor once more, avoids Davy... Isis Leon scores for Gryffindor!" Dawn shouted, as the bell rang once more. "She's barely been on the pitch for a minute and what an impact! Gryffindor lead fourty-thirty!"  


_The Gryffindors were cheering wildly. _

_"Page sends the Quaffle out to Stretton, and now it's Stretton off up the pitch once more..."_

There was no more time for celebrations as the Gryffindor team gave chase. 

_Harry took himself up high above the action and peered everywhere for the Snitch; down below him Megan was once more scouring along the turf for it, but even Harry could see her search was fruitless.  
_  
_Both teams scored twice more: Jeremy Stretton and Randolf Burrow for Ravenclaw, and Demelza and Isis for Gryffindor. _

_The game had now been running for over half an hour and showed no sign of letting up its frantic pace. With the score now at sixty-fifty to Gryffindor, Harry was starting to become rather desperate, for Gryffindor to advance to the finals he needed to catch the Snitch before Ravenclaw could score again, and the Snitch was nowhere to be found. _

_He cruised up high above the action again and was joined by Megan who shrugged at him, indicating her own frustration.  
_  
'Come on, come on,' _Harry thought frantically._ 'Where are you?_'_

_What happened next was, in Harry's opinion, simply very bad luck._

He just had started his search for the Snitch again, and was pulling around the Hufflepuff stands when a Bludger, deflected by Inglebee, came shooting towards him, but with his attention on finding the Snitch, Harry didn't see it until the last second, when the calls of the Hufflepuffs and Dawn drew his attention to the danger.

_Unable to get out of the way, Harry braced himself as the iron ball smashed into his abdomen and sent him spiralling down towards the ground like a helicopter. He hit the turf of the pitch with a soft thud, clutching at his stomach. He felt on fire; his guts were churning..._

Another groan rang out as Harry vomited onto the grass, doubling over and still clutching at his stomach.  


_Ginny called a time-out and flew straight to him,_ "Harry!"

"_I'm fine," he croaked, the pain was like a hot fiery knife, but Harry had felt worse. _

_He got to his feet and staggered over to where his Firebolt Nova lay and held his arm out, "Up!"_

His broomstick leapt up into his hand instantly and he re-mounted and took off, a little wobbly at first. The pain was manageable... he would pay for it later, he knew, but right now he had a Snitch to catch...

"And Harry Potter is up and flying again!" cried Dawn.

_The game recommenced and he could see Isis approaching the Ravenclaw goals again, closely followed by Randolf Burrow on an intercept course... Peakes sent a Bludger towards Burrow to protect Isis as she scored a goal... The bell rang again and a burst of cheer was heard from the Gryffindor stand... Megan was coming up on Harry's right..._

And then he saw it as he banked around the Ravenclaw goals - a shimmer of gold shot past _Isis__' head. _

_The Golden Snitch. _

_He urged his Firebolt Nova forward and heard Megan cry out - she had also seen it - and then they were both streaking across open turf, following the Snitch, which had dived low to the ground. _

_Megan was riding a Firebolt and she was doing a good job of keeping up with Harry's Firebolt Nova - she was a good Seeker, he had to admit - but Harry leaned forward and drew the Firebolt Nova's full speed and shot clean ahead of her, following the Snitch up above the Gryffindor stand, flying inches over the heads of his house-mates, many of them screaming in a mixture of fright and excitement as he shot over them, and Hagrid had to duck to avoid being hit, and with a loud cry of triumph Harry reached out and closed his hand around the little flying ball. _

_An almighty roar went up from the stands as Harry came to a stop, and Madame Hooch's sharp whistle blast cut the air._

"Harry Potter catches the Snitch!" Dawn was shouting, her amplified voice even louder than usual. "And what a catch! Gryffindor wins, two hundred and twenty points to fifty!"

Harry hovered above the Gryffindor stand, one hand holding the Snitch triumphantly as he listened to his house-mate's cheers. When he spotted Hermione, jumping up and down on the spot next to the railing, he gave into the thought that he'd had at the start of the match and swooped down.

_The Gryffindors hushed as Harry hovered next to Hermione, "A kiss for the winning Seeker?"_

_Hermione leaned over the wooden railing and placed a hand on his cheek before kissing him passionately. Denis Creevey, who taken up his late brother's mantle, also leaned over the railing and, with a flash, captured the scene on his camera. When Harry and Hermione drew apart, Harry had barely enough time to register the fact that the rest of the Gryffindor team were bearing down upon him before they were on him, hugging him and yelling in triumph._

_"That was brilliant, Harry!" Isis was yelling._

"Great move, mate, great move!" Cootes called over the din.

"Cracking!" added Peakes.

"Fantastic!" Demelza exclaimed.

"Come on, I think he needs to see Madame Pomfrey," Ginny said to her team, though she was grinning like a Cheshire cat.

Needles to say, Madame Pomfrey had been none too pleased with him when he'd presented himself to her.

_Harry's stomach and lower chest were a mass of dark bruises._

"Drink this, Mr Potter," Madame Pomfrey spoke, handing him a small vial of purple potion. "It will calm your stomach and heal the bruises, but you will still be sore for a few hours."

"I'm sure Hermione can help him with that."

"Ginny!"

With Gryffindors place in the finals secured, a party in Gryffindor Tower was imminent.

_Harry and Hermione were steadily making their way back to the Tower._

"_I _knew_ I shouldn't have let you play!" Hermione was fretting, "What if you've upset your back-"_

"_Hermione," Harry started as he stopped walking and Hermione turned to face him, "It's my stomach that was hit, not my back. Now repeat after me: I'm alright."_

"_I'll never stop worrying about you," she told him in a vowing tone._

"_Nor I you," he responded before leaning in to kiss her._

_But his intentions of a brief kiss were shattered when Hermione threaded her fingers in his hair and began to back towards the wall behind her, between two suits of armour, deepening their kiss as she went. _

_When she felt her back press against the wall, she set to work on Harry's jacket; unzipping it and pushing it off of his shoulders before sliding her hands under his T-shirt and up along the heated flesh of his back, being mindful of his scar, before propelling him forward until he was flush against her. _

_A little stunned by Hermione's aggressiveness, it took a moment for Harry to respond by wrapping his arms around her waist and grinding his hips against hers. Tearing her lips from his, Hermione moaned as he started to run searing kisses down her neck. She angled her head back to give him further access to her skin. Selecting a patch, he began to suckle on her flesh and Hermione moaned again at his ministrations before removing her hands from his back and sliding them beneath his jeans to grab his rear. _

_Harry growled against her throat, but before he could respond:_

"_Aha! Here you two are!"_

_Harry tore his lips from Hermione's throat and turned his head to look at the interloper._

"_Hello, Nick," Harry greeted the Gryffindor ghost, but considering his body's current state, he didn't move from Hermione's embrace. "What brings you here?"_

"_Ginny Weasley sent me to find to find the two of you. She said to tell you that the celebrations have begun and for you, Harry, to get there. Pronto."_

"_Thanks, Nick. We're on our way."_

_Harry saw Nick nod his head and watched the ghost disappear through the wall opposite them before turning and resting his head in the crook of Hermione's neck, nuzzling her love-bite as his body calmed down. _

"_It seems that the Weasleys' all have a rotten sense of timing," Hermione commented when Harry disengaged from her and stepped back after a few minutes silence._

"_You don't need to tell me twice. But I'm glad that she did interrupt us."_

_At Harry's words, Hermione looked like she'd been slapped, but as she turned to walk away, Harry gently grabbed her arm, "I'm sorry," he apologised, "That came out wrong. It's just... I want our first time to be special. For it to be everything that you deserve, not some grope fest in the middle of a deserted corridor."_

_Hermione smiled softly at Harry to assure him that all was forgiven, knowing that while he was incredibly adept at some things, he could also be so adorably clueless about others; girls for example._

_Taking his hand in hers, she spoke, "Come on, Ginny's likely to send Nick to sheppard us back to the Tower if we don't get there soon."_

"_Lead the way, Milady."_

– – o – – o – –

_"_Finally!_" Ginny exclaimed when she saw Harry and Hermione climb through the portrait hole. "__**Where**__ have you two been?"_

"_On our way here," Harry responded._

"_You took your sweet time in doing it!"_

"_Sorry."_

"_Well now that you're here, let's get this party started!"_

– – o – – o – –

_Four hours later found Harry back in his room, preparing for bed.__ He smiled, as he slipped into bed, as Ginny's reaction to his announcement that he was retiring for the night came to mind:_

"Turning in? But it's only eleven o'clock!" Ginny scrutinized him for a moment. "Are you sure that you're feeling alright?"

Harry laughed, "I'm fine, Ginny. I swear. It's just that the Auror trainee routine is deeply ingrained. Eleven is our weekend curfew," he explained.

_He had also had the chance to speak to Rowan Steele during the night:_

"That was an awesome catch," Rowan enthused. "If I had half the skill that you do..."

"If you want, I can give you a little tutelage while I'm here," he told her.

Rowan brightened, "You'd do that?

Harry smiled, "Sure."

"_Thank you!_" she exclaimed, hugging him before disappearing into the crowd.

_Harry's eyes fluttered shut as he dozed off._

She had nowhere to go.

His body pressed into hers, pinned her solidly to the wall behind her as his hands circled her hips, slid between her and the stone at her back, drawing her insatiably closer to the madness that she'd awakened. She bent one knee to hook her leg around his, her calf and inner leg raking up toward his hip. He let his hand follow the angle of her thigh. He suckled at her neck, the warm haven beneath her hair that called to him, like siren's song made flesh. Her skin was hot and sweet on his lips. Her sigh in his ear was even sweeter.

He pushed against her, wild with the way it made their bodies crush together. Her hands were sliding between them, tugging at his shirt. Then his shirt was gone, and her fingers were leaving white impressions over his back and shoulders. She clung to him hungrily. She moaned when his hands moved. And then her shirt was gone, and it was skin touching skin, heat on heat.

He dipped to taste her chest, inebriate himself on her body, and her deft fingers went to his belt...

Tap, tap, tap.

_Harry groaned as he stirred awake._

Tap, tap, tap.

_Rapidly returning to consciousness, he looked for the cause of the sound: Athena._

_The barn owl was perched outside one of his bedroom windows, waiting for him to let her in._

_Vaulting from bed at the flash of lightning that briefly illuminated the room, he strode to the window and opened it. A slightly damp Athena clicked her beak reproachfully at her master before fluttering to her cage and started to preen her wet feathers._

_With his familiar attended to, Harry sauntered back to bed._

_As he settled back under the covers, his mind returned to the vivid dream that he'd been having and he felt his body harden in response._

– – o – – o – –

_In the seventh year girl's dormitory in Gryffindor Tower, Hermione, after having been woken by a clap of thunder, had lain awake in her bed thinking about their interrupted make-out session and what Harry had said to her afterwards._

_Truth be told, she'd been thinking on it for the majority of the night._

_She was more than ready to take the next step in their relationship, had been since Christmas. But Harry had been a little timid about the whole thing. She'd understood, considering his upbringing at the hands of the Dursleys, and had told him that she would wait until he felt that he was ready._

_And tonight he had told her that he was._

'And here I am, stuck in my room instead of with him,_' she thought grumpily._

_But then a devilish idea took root in her mind, and, for once, her logical mind didn't beat it back. She'd have to be careful, she knew, but she was determined to be with Harry._

_Slipping quietly from her four poster bed, Hermione grabbed her wand, and tapping herself on the head, quietly spoke an incantation and then shivered slightly as she felt the trademark cold trickling run down her back as the Disillusionment Charm took effect._

'Now comes the tricky bit,_' she thought as she set off._

_Forty-five minutes later found Hermione hovering outside Harry's door._

_As expected, the trip had not been easy. _

_She had run into Mrs Norris almost as soon as she'd stepped away from the Fat Lady. Crookshanks had come to her aid, leading the caretaker's cat away from his mistress. When he'd returned to her side, he'd looked at her as if to say, '_What would you do without me?_' After that, he'd accompanied her all the way to the Staff Wing, which was out-of-bounds to students, his eyes and ears keen for trouble, moving when it was safe, pausing when it was not._

"Mrowerrr,_" Crookshanks brought his mistress' attention back to her situation._

_Stooping down, Hermione scratched the half-Kneazle behind the ears before straightening and opening Harry's door as quietly as she could._

– – o – – o – –

_Harry had just started to drift off to sleep when his door opened, seemingly of its own accord._

_Instantly Harry's Auror training kicked in and he again vaulted out of bed, grabbing his wand in the process, pointing it at the now closed door. "Who's there?" he growled._

"_Relax Harry. It's just me," came Hermione's voice._

"_Prove it! Show yourself!"_

"Finite._"_

_Harry watched as Hermione shimmered into view before speaking again, "What did I give you for Christmas?"_

"_A book:_ Modern Magical History_."_

_At her answer, Harry lowered his wand. "I had to check."_

"_I expected nothing less," she told him._

"_Hello, Crookshanks," Harry greeted Hermione's familiar as the cat rubbed up against his leg and Harry bent down to scratch him behind the ears. The half-Kneazle began to purr after a few moments of his mistress' suitor's attentions._

"_Now," Harry turned his attention to Hermione, "what brings you here at one-thirty in the morning?"_

"_I couldn't sleep and... I've been thinking."_

_For once, Harry didn't tease her about those famous words. The look on her face told him that whatever was bothering her was a serious matter. Taking her hand, he led them over to the bed, placed his wand on the bedside table and took a seat. Hermione, expectedly, remained on her feet. "Talk to me."_

"_Did you... did you mean what you said earlier?" she asked._

"_About?" _

"_Us taking the next step."_

_Harry wrapped his arms around Hermione's waist and drew her closer to him. "Yes," he said softly._

_Hermione framed his face with her hands, leaning down to kiss him tenderly. When they parted a few minutes later, there was a glazed look in Hermione's eyes. "On your feet, Mr Potter," she commanded huskily._

_Harry did as he was told and once he was standing, Hermione divested him of the loose white T-shirt that he always wore to bed. Once she had flung his shirt away, Harry gathered Hermione up in his arms and gently lay her on his bed, "Are you sure about this?" he queried as he hovered over her._

"_Are you?" she questioned back._

_Harry bent his head and thoroughly kissed her, hoping to convey that he _was_ ready, and Hermione responded with equal fervour._

"_I'm sure." Hermione whispered to him when they drew apart, "I want this. Please, Harry."_

_Harry smiled at her warmly, but then a thought stirred to life in his mind and he responded to it before he forgot: he grabbed his wand and aimed it at the door. "_Silencio._" Placing his wand back on the bedside table, he turned back to Hermione, wrapping her up in his embrace and kissing her passionately as he lowered himself to the mattress._

They'd made love for the first time that night, as well as twice more in the following hours.

Morning light found them cuddled together under the blankets.

_Harry slowly stirred awake at the feel of something tickling his nose. Blearily opening his eyes, he located the source: Hermione's hair._

_With a smile, he tenderly brushed her locks away before letting out a contented sigh as memories of the night's activities drifted through his mind. There was no doubt in Harry's mind that their coupling had been nothing short of pure magic._

_Harry was brought from his thoughts by the feel of Hermione stirring to life against him._

"_Morning," he whispered to her._

"_Hmmm," she absently replied as she trailed a finger down his body. "Good morning to you too," she whispered huskily as she gripped his morning wood and Harry sucked in a sharp breath at the contact._

"_Little minx," he muttered as he gathered her up in his arms and rolled them over. "You'll pay for that."_

_An hour later found the young couple leaving Harry's room, hand in hand. Crookshanks trailed after them. _

Hermione had transfigured her pyjamas into a shirt and jeans so that she could move about the castle without being gawked at, but she still returned to Gryffindor Tower in order to have a shower and freshen up for the day ahead before they headed to the Great Hall.

_Rebecca and Ginny looked up as Harry and Hermione sat down a short distance away from them and began buttering toast, talking in soft tones to each other. __As the two girls continued to watch the couple, they saw that Harry and Hermione were in constant contact with one another and that their general interaction was more intimate then they'd seen previously._

At one point during breakfast, Hermione had brushed her hair off of her neck, revealing her love bite to the hawk-eyed Rebecca and Ginny, who had looked at each other, stunned.

It was only after dinner that evening that the two got a chance to speak to the elder girl

"_Alright, Hermione. Spill!" Ginny ordered her Muggleborn friend._

_Hermione looked up from her book as Ginny and Rebecca entered the dormitory, the latter closing the door behind her._

"_Spill what?" Hermione asked as the two took a seat on their respective beds._

"_What's happened between you and Harry, of course?"_

"_What makes you think that something has happened?" Hermione questioned nonchalantly, returning her attention to the book on her lap, but the slight blush on her cheeks belied vagueness of her tone._

_Emboldened by her friend's reaction, Ginny pressed on, "A: You have a hickey on your neck. _

"_B: You and Harry have been all touchy-feely today." Rebecca added, "Not to mention passionately snogging every time that we've laid eyes on the two of you."_

"_C: You weren't in the dorm for at least half of last night-" Ginny broke off as the ramifications of her words hit home and her eyes went as wide as saucers, "Merlin! You two did it, didn't you?"_

_Hermione's eyes snapped to Ginny, her blush deepening._

"_You _did!" _Ginny shrieked_

"_Ginny, shush!" Hermione hissed as she put a bookmark in her book, shut it, and put it on her bedside table before turning back to her flabbergasted friends._

"So?_"_

_Hermione nodded._

_Ginny squealed. "Oh man, if those Slytherin girls knew, they'd keel over on the spot!"_

_Hermione had confided to her two friends after parting ways with Harry that night about the contents of the infamous note._

"_Is it true that it... you know... hurts the first time?" Ginny questioned after a moment._

_Hermione nodded again._

"_How bad?"_

_Hermione considered her memories of the experience for a moment. "It feels more like a burning sensation. There's a sharp pain when he first..." she made a suggestive hand gesture so she wouldn't have to say it, "then burning. But it gets so caught up in everything else that you stop paying attention to it."_

"_Other than the... burning... how was it?"_

"_Good, I guess. Intense. 'Overload' probably best pegs it."_

_Ginny suddenly smiled._

"_What?" Hermione asked warily._

_Ginny shook her head. "Nothing."_

"_It's not nothing, I know that smile. What?"_

_Ginny winced. "Don't take this as any kind of insult, because it's _not,_ but I was just thinking that most of the students here at Hogwarts would probably name you as the girl most likely not to lose your virginity until you were thirty... but here you've actually lost it earlier than just about all of us."_

_Hermione smiled, not saying a thing_

_Ginny watched Hermione for a moment, then that sly, mischievous smile was back. "So I guess that leaves one question... what are the measurements on the 'wand' of the famous Boy Who Lived?"_

_Hermione was absolutely scarlet. "Well, since his is the only 'wand' I've ever seen I'm not really fit to judge. _I _think it's... uh... impressive enough." She felt like her skin was on fire from the chest up. "Besides, would the both of you really be able to sit across the breakfast table from him and act totally normal if I told you he was hung like a horse?"_

_Ginny and Rebecca broke into roaring laughter. _

_When Ginny could breathe again, she wiped tears from her eyes and gasped, "No... you're right... I probably don't want to know."_

TBC...

79


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note:**

I want to wish a Merry Christmas and happy New Year to all my readers.

Thanks go to my Beta: Blueglaceon.

Thanks also go to MissAnnThropic, who has allowed me to borrow ideas and exerts from her brilliant story _Vox Corporis_.

And ya'll know the rap; Harry Potter doesn't belong to me.

Rebecca Knight, Pan and Athena and every other character that you haven't heard of do, so no touchies without permission.

**Chapter 4**

But just when things were sailing smoothly, it had always seemed to be his lot to hit some sort of a speed bump.

_Harry sighed as he watched Hermione eating her lunch from his place at the Staff table._

_If someone had told him a month ago that this would happen he would have replied that they had been severely Confunded and that his and Hermione's bond was at its strongest. Yet here he was: alone and wondering what in Merlin's name he had done to cause Hermione's avoidance of him._

_It had all started a few days after their first night together._

The Gryffindor Quidditch team were headed to the pitch to practice, Ginny talking animatedly about tactics with Harry.

_Hermione had surprised them all by tagging along._

"Harry, wait up!"

Harry stopped at Hermione's call and turned to see her jogging to catch up with the team. "What's the matter?" he questioned, worry lacing his features as she drew level with him.

"Nothing's the matter, I just wanted to come and watch you practice," she stated in a matter-of-factly manner.

Harry couldn't help himself. "Are you sure that it's the practice that you'll be watching?"

Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Oi, lovebirds! Time's a ticking!" Ginny hollered back at them

_Harry had spent the first half of the practice studying Rowan's skill and working out where she needed improvement. _

_But he had discovered, as he had started to compete with her to hone her skills as well as teach her a few of his own tricks that he'd developed over the years, all the while hearing Hermione's cheers from the stands below him, that she was a fast learner and that they got along like a house on fire, laughing and joking like they'd know each other for years._

_When Ginny had brought the practice to a close, Harry had turned his attention to his girlfriend, intent on replicating their Quidditch match kiss. _

_But all he had found was an empty grandstand._

_Returning to the castle, he had found her in the Library._

"Hermione?"

Hermione raised her head from the book she was reading to look at her Quidditch garbed and windswept-haired boyfriend, "Hey."

"Forget to add a particular detail?" he teased her upon seeing the four foot length of parchment that she was working on.

"You can never be too thorough," came her reply.

_Assured that all was fine, he had headed back to his room to take a much needed shower._

_But then, as the days had passed, Hermione's behaviour had begun to change when she was around him. At first she had been inseparable from him when he was with Rowan discussing their Quidditch training. _

"Have you ever preformed the Wronski Feint?" Rowan questioned

"In a match? No. But I've attempted it many times whilst I was at the Weasleys over various holidays."

"Hey, Harry," Hermione greeted him as she sat down beside him and begin to eat dinner.

"Hey, Hermione," Harry returned the greeting with a peck on the cheek

But their usual nightly conversation about how their respective days had gone was halted by Slughorn's arrival. "Harry, m'boy! Just the man I wanted to see!"

Harry turned to look at the Potions Master. "How can I help, Professor?"

"The Slug Club is having a little get together this weekend and I was wondering if you and Miss Granger will be attending?"

Harry looked to Hermione, who nodded her head in acceptance, before returning his attention to Slughorn; "I don't see why not."

"Excellent! 7:30 on Saturday night," Slughorn responded before continuing on his way to the Staff table

_When Saturday night had rolled around they had rocked up to Slughorn's office arm in arm._

"I still can't believe _you_ accepted. You were always so wary of these get-togethers in sixth year."

"I still am. But with all Slughorn did to help us to defeat Voldemort, I owe it to him to attend a couple of these things while I'm here."

"Which is only six more weeks," Hermione stated softly.

"Hey," he soothed. "It's not like I'm going to drop off the face of the Earth. Besides, once exams start, you're likely to start banishing me from here just so that you can study in peace without having to nag a certain pair of boys to do the same."

At his words, Hermione shook her head, "Honestly, Harry. Where study is concerned, you were never too bad. Ron, on the other hand..."

Harry laughed. "Thanks for the vote of confidence. And for the record I've never found homework _necessarily_ vile or repugnant. I've ever only despised it when it cut into Quidditch practice, or when it was from Snape. And for that matter, during the summer holidays, it became a retreat for me when Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia would forbid anything to do with magic, but in doing my homework, I could remember what I had to go back to when term began and cling to that light to get me through everything until we returned to Hogwarts."

At the mention of his treatment at the hands of the Dursleys, Hermione's eyes narrowed, but she said nothing because they had arrived at their destination.

"Well, here we are. After you, milady," Harry stated as he opened the door for Hermione and then followed her in.

The couple were immediately greeted by Slughorn's voice, "Here's the man of the hour! Harry. Miss Granger."

"Good evening, Professor," the two responded together.

"Come in, come in."

The teens followed the Potions Master inside and took their seats around the table.

"Now, I believe that you know most of those here," Slughorn informed Harry as the others took their seats and the Auror-in-training noticed that Rowan was among the guests. "There's just one new face; Rowan Steele. Rowan's father, Beau Steele, is one of the Beaters for the Holyhead Harpies."

"Like father, like daughter, huh?" Harry quipped to Rowan, who grinned at him in return as she sat down.

"Beau was a little disappointed that she didn't follow in his footsteps. But from what I've seen, she's not a bad Seeker, and with your tutelage, Harry, she's sure to become even better," Slughorn said to Harry as their meal appeared before them.

_As dinner had progressed, Harry had spotted Hermione looking at him and Rowan with a guarded expression, but every time that he'd opened his mouth to ask her what was the matter Slughorn had the unerring ability to divert his attention by asking him a question or his opinion about something or other._

"What do you think Hermione?"

When no answer came, Harry turned to look at his girlfriend, only to find an empty space where she should have been. Furrowing his brow, Harry searched the room trying to locate Hermione, but there was no sign of her.

"Something the matter, Harry, m'boy?" Slughorn asked as he approached.

"Have you seen Hermione, Professor?"

"Miss Granger? She left a few minutes ago."

But before Harry could make a move to leave and find his girlfriend, Slughorn had put an arm around his shoulders and steered him back towards the group.

_After Slughorn's party, Hermione's behaviour had turned peculiar still: she had become increasingly cautious towards the new Gryffindor Seeker when she was around Harry and had started hanging out with Ginny and Rebecca more and more until it was now up to a point that he had not spoken to her in over two weeks._

"_This is ridiculous," he muttered to himself._

_He needed to talk to Ginny and Rebecca and find out just _what _was going on._

_Four hours later found Harry making his way through the grounds. _

_To the south of him he could just make out the Gryffindor Quidditch team as they went about the evening's training. He had told Ginny before they had left the Great Hall that he would not be attending and she had looked at him with understanding in her blue eyes. Ahead, Harry could see Hagrid's hut coming into view and the Auror-in-training spotted Rebecca playing a game of tag with Pan._

"_Hey, Rebecca," he called out to her when he was within earshot._

_Rebecca stopped and turn to look at him, "Hiya, Harry!" She returned the greeting enthusiastically. _

_But in turning to greet her friend's boyfriend, Rebecca had dropped her guard and Pan seized the opportunity, stealthily creeping up behind his mistress before: _Thump.

_Rebecca laughed from her prone position beneath the griffin. "Alright, you got me."_

_Head held high, Pan proudly hopped off of Rebecca and Harry offered her a hand and helped her to her feet and she dusted herself off._

"_Can I speak to you?"_

_Rebecca turned serious in an instant. "Let me guess: Hermione?"_

_Harry nodded his head. "I don't understand," he began as Buckbeak came up to him and he rested a hand on the beast's neck, "what I've done. I've never seen her act like this..." he trailed off as realisation dawned on him like a Bludger to the stomach._

_He_ had_ seen Hermione behave like this before, only at the time Ron had been the cause and he the one that she had turned to. "Hermione's jealous!" he exclaimed, startling Buckbeak, who gave a screech. "Sorry, Buckbeak." He soothed the hippogriff before turning back to Rebecca. "But why?"_

"_One word for you: Quidditch."_

_Harry shot her a questioning expression._

"_She thinks that because she's never been a huge fan of Quidditch that the two of you have nothing in common," Rebecca elaborated. _

_Harry shook his head. "Which is completely mental."_

"_That's exactly what Ginny and I have been telling her from the start. But you know what Hermione is like, the more she saw you and Rowan together, the more she became convinced of her views."_

"_I told her, I _told _her that she's the only one for me," Harry spoke in a low tone as he looked back to the castle. "I love her just the way she is."_

_Rebecca's mossy green gaze softened. "She knows, but she still feels vulnerable about your relationship because-" _

"_Of that _bloody_ note!" Harry growled._

"_Go and find her," Rebecca told him simply. "She's in the Library."_

"_Thanks," Harry stated, giving Buckbeak a final stroke on the neck before turning and striding back up the hill toward the Stone Circle._

_Harry strode along the hallway that led to Library. Turning the corner, he crept quietly through the building so as to not earn Madame Pince's wrath, scanning each area until he had spotted Hermione._

_Approaching the table where she was seated, he spoke up, "Can I join you?"_

_Hermione startled at his voce and turned to face him. "Harry! What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be at practice?"_

"_Some things are more important than Quidditch. This is one of them."_

"_This?" she questioned as he sat down beside her._

"_I spoke with Rebecca this afternoon," he told her and she looked down at the textbook in front of her. _

_Harry slid his fingers under her chin and guided her to look at him. "__Just because you're not a huge fan of Quidditch doesn't mean I that love you any less, Hermione,__ surely you know that__?__We each have something that we love: books and learning are to you what Quidditch is to me.__And for that matter, do you have any idea just how many times Ron and I would have flunked out of Hogwarts over the years had it not been for you?"_

_Hermione looked down at her hands again. "I know that, but-"_

"_The note brought your old fears to the surface." _

_Hermione nodded. "For years I thought that you were out of my league and that you'd never see me as anything more than a friend. And now we're together, it feels like a dream and-"_

"_You're afraid that it will come to an end. Wait… you thought I was_ out of your league?"

_Hermione nodded._

"_Hermione, what in the world made you think that?"_

"_Really, Harry, isn't it obvious? You're Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived. You're a celebrity and some day you were going to end up with a Cho Chang or a Fleur Delacour... Someone popular and beautiful and I knew I had to accept that. Truly, as long as you were happy, that's what was most important. I was always going to be regular old ugly Hermione Granger, but as long as I was plain old Hermione, Harry Potter's friend, I was fine with it."_

_Harry's face went from stunned to displeased as he listened to her. He scowled in her direction as his mind went over all that she'd told him._

"_I hate it when you do that," he finally said._

_Hermione blinked. "Do what?"_

"_Say you're not pretty."_

"_It's the truth," she said with a dismissive shrug._

"_It's mental," Harry retorted. "You're more than pretty, Hermione."_

_Hermione opened her mouth to speak, but all that came out was an embarrassing squeak. She clamped her mouth shut and cleared her throat while Harry smirked._

"_You don't have to say that just because you're my boyfriend," she finally managed to say. "Honestly, Harry, I'm not going to be upset because you think I'm plain to look at. I know I am."_

_Then Harry's hand was touching her face, lightly and delicately like she might be built from fine snow but still enough for her to feel the warmth of his palm on her cheek. Her heart did a skip for the look on Harry's face. He looked enchanted._

"_I wish you could see yourself the way I see you," he mused aloud, almost to himself, then he directed his words to her. "I didn't say you're pretty because I'm your boyfriend. If you'd asked me in third year I would have told you so... but now that I'm your boyfriend, I know that it's okay to say that I don't think you're pretty."_

_Hermione tried to smile bravely through the ache, because she refused to let the truth wound her... not a truth that she'd come to terms with so long ago._

"_I think you're beautiful," Harry finished lowly._

"_You... but I... I'm_ not_. I've heard it all my life, Harry. Plain, boring, ugly Hermione Granger. I have looked in a mirror a time or two, and I know why they all say those things. It's cruel for them to say it the way they do, but that doesn't make it any less true."_

_Harry frowned and slipped his hand from her cheek to the column of her neck, and at once Hermione shivered. When they were kissing, he put his hand there when he was about to move aside her hair to nuzzle at her throat. It was distracting to say the least._

"_Hermione?"_

"_Y-yes?" His fingers were just barely grazing the skin of her neck, tickling and maddening at once._

"_Do you trust me?"_

"_Of course I do."_

_Harry leaned in, moved her hair aside, and placed a gentle kiss on her neck. Then, without drawing away, he practically whispered in her ear, "Then just trust me and believe me when I say that you're beautiful _to me."

_To him. _

_She could do that. _

_It wasn't asking her to throw away a lifetime's worth of teasing and taunts about her hair and her teeth and her everything else, all of it completely unimpressive. It only asked that she make an exception for an exceptional person in her life. After all, Harry knew sides of her that no one else, no one that called her ugly, knew. _

_Put that way, she could believe him._

_Hermione felt a sudden tightness in her chest; it felt weird to be beautiful. _

_It made a well of emotions bubble dangerously close to the surface, and she was a little frightened to think what might happen if they overcame her. She bit back an unintelligible sound in the back of her throat and snaked her arms around Harry's shoulders. She wrapped herself around him and Harry slipped his arms around her to return the embrace. She lowered her cheek to his shoulder and closed her eyes, surrendering to the moment of being with Harry, happy and beautiful in his arms._

"_Just promise me something," Harry spoke after a time of silence._

"_What?"_

"_The next time that something is troubling you, please come and talk to me about it. You have _no_ idea just how many times I've beaten myself up over what I may or may not have done to cause you to distance yourself over this past month."_

_Hermione smiled against his chest. "Okay."_

"_Oh, and Hermione?"_

"_Hmmm?"_

"_If anything, _you're_ out of _my _league, not the other way around."_

"_Don't be ridiculous. Fame aside, because I know that's not really your doing, you are a far more powerful wizard than I am a witch. When it comes down to raw magic, you're beyond me, Harry."_

"_I doubt that, but even if I were, there's no arguing that you're way smarter than me."_

"_Books and cleverness," she returned, a small smile flitting across her face at the memory._

The next week had passed in a blur of lessons and meditation sessions and before they had known it, it was the weekend of the Quidditch final.

"_This... feels weird..."_

_Hermione turned to look at Harry. "What does?"_

"_Being here, in the stands, instead of out there playing."_

_Hermione's eyes softened. She understood that Harry had to be feeling like a piece of him was missing as he sat watching their house team face off against Hufflepuff; after all, he'd played Quidditch since first year and had only stopped playing when circumstances were against him._

"_You'll be fine," Hermione assured her boyfriend. "Just promise me that you won't go diving after the Snitch if it comes close."_

_At this, Harry smiled and leaned into kiss Hermione briefly before returning his attention to the game as Raine scored a goal for Gryffindor._

_Two and a half hours later, Madame Hooch's whistle pierced the air. _

"_Rowan Steele has caught the Snitch!" Dawn cried. "Gryffindor wins; three hundred points to one hundred and fifty!"_

_The Gryffindor stand cheered madly. Out on the pitch, Ginny and the rest of the team had flocked to Rowan and were sharing a group hug as they descended to the ground to accept the trophy from Madame Hooch._

After that time had seemed to fly by, and, all too soon, Hermione found herself accompanying Harry to the main gates.

"_Promise me that you'll be careful," she whispered to him as they shared a final hug just outside the iron gates. "I don't want to see you on a hospital bed again anytime soon if I can help it."_

"_I'll try. But you know how it is: I don't go looking for trouble, trouble usually finds me," Harry replied as he drew back._

_With a soft smile, Hermione leaned into him for a kiss. When they parted, Harry gave her hand a final squeeze before stepping away from her and Disapparating with a _crack.

As Harry had resumed his Auror training, Hermione had thrown herself into her N.E.W.T exams, all the while continuing the token process.

"_Okay, Hermione." Rebecca turned to the elder girl, as she, Hermione and Ginny sat by the Black Lake going through their Potion's revision. Pan was lounging in the grass beside his mistress, busily hunting grasshoppers. "Ingredients of the Draught of Peace?"_

_Hermione began rattling off the ingredients for the potion. She spoke solidly for a few minutes, but then, all of a sudden, she stopped dead and looked like she was a million miles away._

"_Hermione?" Ginny questioned, waving her hand in front of the brunette's face. "Earth to Hermione!"_

_Hermione snapped back into reality._

"_You okay?" the red-head asked, worry lacing her voice._

"_I'm fine," Hermione responded before looking at Rebecca. "One of Pan's wing feathers just tokened itself to me. May I?"_

"_Might want to ask _him_ that," came Rebecca's bemused reply._

_Hermione looked to the griffin. "Pan?"_

_Pan got to his feet and approached her, stopping when he was a few feet in front of her. The griffin regarded her for a moment before spreading his wings and Hermione stood up to retrieved on her token; a primary feather._

"_Thank you, Pan," Hermione said softly to the familiar, who clicked his beak at her, before she returned her attention to Ginny and Rebecca. "Now, where were we?" _

– – o – – o – –

_**Hundreds of miles away.**_

"_Permission to speak, sir," Harry questioned his drill sergeant._

"_Permission granted, Potter."_

"_A token has presented itself to me, sir. Permission to retrieve it?"_

_The drill sergeant paused; all of the training officers had been told by the Minister that Potter was attempting to become an Animagus. "Permission granted. Don't dawdle."_

"_Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."_

_The sergeant watched Potter as he strode over to a nearby tree, selected and stripped a small portion of bark from it, stuffed it in his pocket and then returned to the line-up._

"_I still can't believe you got away with that!" Ron exclaimed, several hours later, as he, Harry and Neville relaxed in the common room dressed in singlets and tracksuit pants; Neville was reading a book on Herbology whilst Ron was playing a game of chess with Harry, who was currently located at the stove, cooking a batch of chicken noodle soup, all of them glad to be back on campus after they gruelling week they'd just had. _

"_It wasn't all that hard," Harry grinningly replied, "considering that Shacklebolt ordered all the training officers to give me a little leeway whilst I'm collecting tokens."_

"_Pawn to E5," Ron ordered and then watched as his pawn moved forward two paces and took out Harry's castle in the neighbouring square. "Who told you that?_

"_Tonks."_

"_Famous Harry Potter," Ron muttered, shaking his head. "Always the exception." _

_Harry rolled his eyes. "I don't know why you keep going on about that, Ron. You guys are just as well known, nowadays, as I am," he told his red-haired best friend._

"_And I'm beginning to understand just why you hate it so much, Harry," Neville spoke up, his eyes never leaving the book in his lap._

"_Speak for yourself," Ron responded automatically._

"_See you guys tomorrow," Neville said, two hours later, as he opened the door to his room. "Thank Merlin it's the weekend!"_

"_You can say that again!" Harry grinned as he opened his own door. "Night, Neville."_

"_Night, Harry. Night, Ron."_

"_Night, Neville. Night, Harry."_

"_Night, Ron."_

_Harry chuckled to himself as he entered his quarters. The trainee's rooms had been alphabetically assigned to them when they had started their three year long schooling; so while Harry and Neville were a few doors apart, Ron's was the last in the building._

The sun shone down on the golden plains around him as he slunk along, smooth and sure.

Muscles rippled and his senses were almost maddeningly acute. Not a bird wing fluttered or cricket jumped that he did not know about. He was part of the fabric of the savannah, and he felt its pulse through the bottom of his feet, heard it with his ears, tasted it on the wind.

Ahead of him lay his destination: a waterhole, where he would quench his thirst and rest for a while out of the sweltering heat.

As he bent down to drink, he saw his reflection in the water's surface, jumping and dancing as a result of his lapping tongue, but because of all the movement, he could only make out his messy black hair and green-gray eyes...

_Harry awoke abruptly and stared up at the ceiling of his quarters. _

_Early morning light spread from the window, marking the hour as close to seven-thirty. _

_Harry blinked and took a deep breath, fighting to orient himself. His body was rigid, his skin flushed and coated in a sheen of sweat and his toes were curled. After a moment adjusting to being awake, he realized he was clutching his sheets in his fists. He consciously opened his fingers and let go his hold._

_Harry sighed and rubbed at his face with both hands. _

_That dream again. _

_Harry had had his fair share of unusual dreams over the years and tended not to think much of them, but for the past four nights, it had been one dream in particular; the savannah dream. _

_It touched him so powerfully that he awoke as he had from a Voldemort vision-dream, but without the pain, terror or sensation of diseased rot in his blood. The savannah dream was similar in gripping him so intensely, in jarring him awake to find that his body had been just as gripped by the dream as his mind._

_Harry sat up in bed and unexpectedly shivered in the morning air. For a moment, he'd actually expected the heat of the savannah and not the balmy cool of his quarters. _

"_That decides it," he muttered to himself as he got out of bed. _

_He'd not thought anything of the dream the first time, except that it had been abnormal from his usual brand of dream, good or bad. When he had had the same dream a second time, he thought it an odd coincidence. After the third night, he had begun to wonder if he should tell Hermione once they returned to campus. Now this, the fourth night in a row, made up his mind for him. _

_Harry strode out of his room, down the hall and into the trainee common room. _

_Approaching the fireplace, he grabbed a handful of Floo powder before crouching down to the crackling hearth._

"_Gryffindor common room," he spoke loudly before dropping the powder into the flames, watched as they turned green and stuck his head in._

– – o – – o – –

_Ginny yawned as she made her way downstairs alone. She had been the last to rise of her dorm, but she was in no hurry to get to breakfast. As she was crossing the common room, a voice called out to her from the fireplace._

"_Hey, Harry," she greeted him as crouched by the hearth._

"_Hey, Gin. How've the exams been going?"_

_Ginny pulled a face. "Don't ask."_

_Harry chuckled. "That bad, huh? How's Hermione coping? Not being too hard on herself, I hope?" _

"_She's going well. And you know Hermione, not happy unless she's giving a hundred and ten percent."_

_Harry chuckled again. "That's my girl. Is she about?"_

"_She's at breakfast at the moment. I could go and get her if you like," The youngest Weasley offered_

_Harry shook his head. "No, it's alright. I'll get changed and come and see her myself."_

"_See you shortly, then," Ginny responded as Harry's head disappeared with a _pop _and she continued on her way._

– – o – – o – –

_Half an hour later, Harry stepped into the Great Hall and spotted Hermione sitting with Ginny and Rebecca halfway up the Gryffindor table. _

_As he approached them, he could see that Hermione was nibbling on a muffin absently, her full attention on an open book on the table, slanted so she could fit both her plate and book before her. It forced her to cock her head to read as she chewed at the same time. Harry knew Hermione well enough to know that her chews would be timed with the completion of a sentence. Bites matched to new paragraphs, assuming they weren't short ones, drinks with page turns. _

_It was a habit Harry thought strangely cute in his bookish girlfriend._

_But so rapt was he this observation, he completely missed another; a blue glow had sprung up around Hermione's body as he drew closer to her. When he did notice it, Harry stopped short, blinking several times to see if his eyes were playing tricks on him. _

_But the glow was still there._

_Sensing his presence behind her, Hermione turned and looked up at him, smiling. "Morning, Harry."_

"_Uh... are you... feeling alright, Hermione?"_

_Hermione furrowed her brows. "Of course. Why do you ask?"_

"_You do know that you're glowing, don't you?"_

_Hermione's eyes widened as she caught sight of her reflection in a nearby silver pitcher. _

_But instead of fretting, she turned to Rebecca, who was trying her best to hide a mile-wide grin she bore with her hand, and quirked an eyebrow at her copper-haired friend. "So this is the mystery potion; Cupids Draught!"_

"_Mystery potion?" Harry repeated, not sure how to react to the revelation, and as he sat down next to Hermione, he recalled what Slughorn had told their class in sixth year about the potion in question: _"Cupids Draught enables the drinker to determine who their heart truly desires; when brewed correctly, the drinker finds a blue glow emanating from their body whenever they are in the presence of their true love."

"_The sixth and seventh year Gryffindor girls had a slumber party last night so that we could unwind a little," Ginny explained to Harry, but then realised something. "Do you know what a slumber party is?" she questioned._

"_Yeah. Dudley had a few of them when he was little. I used to sneak out of my cupboard to catch snippets of whatever movie they were watching."_

_Hermione's brain screeched to a stuttering halt, her lungs hitched, her skin prickled with cold dread when his words registered in her mind. She tensed and looked at Harry, who was watching her, confused by her sudden change in demeanour. "Your_ what?"

_Harry's expression tensed at once. He'd not meant to say what he did, she could tell by looking at him._

_But neither would he ignore her question; he sent her a pleading look, silently asking her not to press the matter in their current location and that he would tell her later on. Hermione relented and turned back to Ginny and Rebecca, who were looking at Harry, flabbergasted by his admittance, and prompted Ginny, "You were saying?"_

_To her credit, Ginny carried on like Harry hadn't said a word about his pre-Hogwarts years, "And with some time and effort, we managed to coax Hermione away from her studies. During the night, Rebecca dared Hermione to drink a potion blindfolded."_

"_You know," Rebecca cut in, "now that I think about it, you didn't seem too surprised about the ID of the potion."_

"_That's because I figured out what it was."_

"_How?" Rebecca demanded._

"_The temperature and colour; Cupids Draught is icy cold when swallowed and is pale yellow in colour, which I saw when I looked at the droplets that I spilt on my hands._

_Rebecca shook her head. "Should've known better than to try to pull the wool over your eyes, Hermione. Smartest witch of her age, indeed."_

"_And for that matter, I wouldn't be looking so full of yourself if I were you, Becca," Hermione stated to the future-Magizoologist_

"_Why's that?" Rebecca asked warily._

"_Because I'm not the only one that drank Cupids Draught."_

_Ginny's and Rebecca's eyes widened at the elder girl's words. _

"_You didn't!" they cried in unison._

"_As the Muggle saying goes; what's good for the goose is better for the gander," Hermione told her two friends as she picked up her discarded muffin and turned to her boyfriend, "Now, what brings you here?"_

_It took a moment for Harry to remember said reason. "Have you been having any unusual dreams?"_

_Hermione's eyes brightened and Harry felt relieved; Hermione only lit up like that for good things._

"_Yes, I have!" she responded excitedly. "Just last night, in fact." _

_Hermione put her muffin down again and shifted to more directly face Harry. "This is just what we wanted to have happen, Harry," she said softly. "It means we're internalizing the transformation spell just as we should for it to work. It's become ingrained and it's finding its way into our dreams, part of our subconscious. It means our inner animals are stirring."_

_Harry was just glad to hear it wasn't him alone having unusual dreams. "So what did you dream?"_

"_I was in the mountains with snow and coniferous trees all around me, and I was running. I was_ so fast." _Hermione's eyes lost focus, took on a dreamy quality, and Harry knew that Hermione's dreams had been just as intense and visceral as his._

_An hour later found Harry and Hermione seated under their tree by the Black Lake._

"_Do you want to talk about it?" she questioned softly._

_._

_He sighed, resigned, as he said, "I didn't have a bedroom at Privet Drive until I was eleven. Before that they kept me in a cupboard under the stairs."_

_Her heart broke. _

_Her heart raged. _

_She knew her mouth was agape and her eyes unblinking as she tried to wrap her head around Harry's confession. How anyone could be so cruel to the one she loved so dearly... it was unspeakable, _unthinkable. _Harry was an amazing, caring, loyal person, and he'd been treated like he was a vile criminal or a monster. If the Dursleys were magical, she would have asked, in an instant, that they be sent to Azkaban for the injustices they'd so callously heaped on Harry. _

_With Harry's fame in the wizarding world, it just might happen. _

_If the wizarding world knew how their icon of triumph over evil had been treated... Whether he liked it or not, Harry was important to a lot of people he'd never even met. Their world wouldn't stand for it, but in the Muggle world, no one did a thing to help a kind-hearted, neglected little boy locked away in a cupboard like an unwanted stray dog._

"_Harry... I... I never knew," she whispered. _

_How bad had it been? She thought she'd known most of the sordid details about Harry's upbringing. _

_She'd not known this. _

_And she couldn't help but wonder; what else didn't she know? How much worse was it than she suspected?_

_Harry's lips pursed. "I never told you. I never told anyone. It doesn't matter, Hermione."_

"_It _matters,_" she replied._

"_Why?" he asked her in a wearied voice._

_She could hear how much he_ wanted_ it to not matter. She wished it was that easy, for his sake. She'd give anything to just brush it all away like a fine layer of dust on a countertop. _

"_Because it's wrong."_

"_I know it is. Now. But that doesn't change what happened." _

_Hermione reached out and ran her hand over the back of his neck. Harry took in a breath, despite himself. _

"_I'm so sorry you had to grow up with that wretched family," she said softly to him. "You deserve better. It's not fair that you had to grow up there just because your parents were brave enough to defy Voldemort, to fight him. There are so many witches and wizards our age who never lost their families because _their_ parents let someone else fight for them, and it's not fair to you.__ But_ never_ think the way I feel about you would change because of what you have hidden in your past. _That _doesn't matter, not to me."_

"_Thank you."_

_Hermione tucked herself into his side, sliding her arm around his stomach to hold him in a partial hug. Harry looped his arm over her back _

"_Maybe one day you'll know everything..." he said faintly._

_If her heart could take it, she thought, but instead of saying that she gave his middle a squeeze, because, by the tone of his voice, it was obvious he was scared by the idea. "Whether I do or not it won't change us, I promise you that. Your present and future are more than enough for me."_

_She was utterly still a moment, looking so blissfully content and peaceful, then a look of hazy concentration fixed on her features. She opened her eyes and glanced up at Harry searchingly. In one smooth motion she rose to her knees and knelt before him, gaze intent. Harry raised his eyebrows questioningly._

_Hermione reached for the pair of small scissors she'd started to carry with her after Harry had returned to his Auror training. She regarded him a moment, started toward him and halted, fidgeted, then asked, "May I?"_

_Harry realized what she meant. "Yeah."_

_Hermione leaned over him, plucked at his hair, chose with care, and snipped. Her hand came away with a small pinch of black hairs between her fingers. She stared at them, blinked, then smiled up at Harry. "Seven," she said then retrieved her bag and added Harry's lock of hair._

"_Did you know we could token off each other?" he asked as she shoved the small bag, lumpy and misshapen from its contents, back into her pocket. _

"_Honestly? No. I wouldn't think we're animal enough to count. But we-" _

"_-Can't ignore a token," Harry finished with a grin. "How many more exams do you have?"_

"_Six," she said softly and then looked out across the lake, where the tentacles of the Giant Squid could be seen snatching pieces of toast, courtesy of a couple of first years, from the lake's surface, an unreadable expression settling on her features._

"_What is it?" Harry queried._

_Hermione looked back at him. "It's just... I can't seem to wrap my head around the fact that I'll be graduating in two week's time. It feels like it was only yesterday that I was getting on the Hogwarts Express for the first time. And now it's 'Goodbye school, hello world!'"_

"_You'll rise to the challenge, though," Harry told her. "You always do."_

_Hermione smiled and leaned into him for a kiss, but their mouths only had a few moments of contact before she pulled away, giggling._

"_Er... what've I done now?" Harry asked, bewildered._

_In response, Hermione ran her fingertips along his jaw line, feeling the stubble that was there. "You haven't shaved."_

"_We had boot camp this week. Five a.m. start, eleven p.m. stop. By the time we finished each day, we were too knackered to do anything else but have a quick shower and go straight to bed," he told her before muttering. "The dreams didn't help matters either."_

"_The dreams?" Hermione repeated. "You mean you've had more than one Animagus dream?"_

"_Same dream for the past four nights. You could say that it became my alarm clock."_

_Hermione smiled tenderly at her boyfriend as she settled on his lap and started to run her fingers through his hair. "That considered, I'm surprised that you got here as early as you did. You must be exhausted!"_

"_I did have a bit of reprieve this morning. My 'alarm' didn't go off until seven-thirty," Harry let out a contented breath and closed his eyes at Hermione's ministrations. _

_Hermione watched him for a few minutes before a mischievous idea rose in her mind and she reacted to it by poking him in the side. Harry's eyes snapped open as he gave a strange chirrup and flinched away. _

_Hermione brought up her head at once, a smile blooming on her face. "Why, Harry Potter, are you _ticklish?_"_

"_I don't think so," Harry answered plainly, "but then, no one's ever bothered to try tickling me before. I don't think Dudley's little love taps with the boxing gloves count. In any case, I never laughed about it."_

_Hermione smirked and like any good, methodical academician she poked him in the ribs again to see what happened. Harry jerked, made a strangled noise... and a quick smile twitched at the corners of his mouth. Hermione grinned and poked him again, really starting to enjoy this new game. _

"_Hey," Harry said, breaking into a full smile even as he tried to sidle away, "cut that out."_

_Hermione giggled. "Oh, not a chance." She poked him again. _

_He laughed, and he sounded surprised that being poked in the ribs could make him laugh. "Hermione, really, stop. That..."_

"_Tickles? That's the point, Harry." She used both hands this time, a flurry of fingers digging at his side. _

_If Harry had never been tickled before, she meant to do a bang on job._

_Harry chuckled, then he laughed, then he was howling with laughter as he feebly tried to fend off her attack. Hermione's breath caught at the sound. She'd never heard Harry laugh like that. _

_Never. _

_And it was like music. Deeper than his 'that's amusing' laugh, throaty and rich, both older and younger at the same time. It almost hurt to think this might be the first time Harry had ever laughed so hard he had tears in his eyes. The first time he'd ever belly-laughed to the point where he couldn't breathe. From the first time anyone had ever cared enough to tickle him._

_Hermione found herself laughing along with him for the joy of his laugh._

_When he could stand no more, Harry grabbed her wrists and tugged. Hermione was thrown off balance and fell into him. Harry met her with his mouth on hers. Hermione opened to his tongue when it teased her lips. They may have kissed for minutes on end, but they were still breathless from their tussle and Harry broke first to take a deep breath. Hermione, content as a cat in a sunny patch, purred, "Not fair."_

"_I was desperate."_

"_You're ticklish." Hermione pulled her hands free from his grip to wrap her arms around his neck. They were inches apart, their noses almost touching. Harry's eyes were bright with laughter, his cheeks pink, his mouth still upturned at the corners. _

"_Guess I am," he said, and it seemed a wondrous new discovery to him as well._

_Hours later found Harry and Hermione returning to the Great Hall for lunch._

_But as the young couple walked between the tables, many of the students began to stop eating and stare at them, and it took Hermione a minute to remember just what they were gawking at, as there hadn't been to many in the Great Hall when Harry had arrived at breakfast time._

"_Looks like Rebecca's true love has been revealed," Harry commented as they took a seat and started helping themselves to lunch._

"_Who?"_

"_You tell me."_

_Hermione followed Harry's line-of-sight and spotted her copper-haired friend sitting halfway up the table with a blonde-haired boy, the same blue glow radiating from her body. _

"_That's Jason Wild." Hermione turned back to her boyfriend. "He's a seventh year Ravenclaw. From what Becca has told me, he wants to become a dragon keeper once he leaves Hogwarts."_

"_Sounds like a perfect match for Rebecca then."_

_Hermione rolled her eyes. "Are you going to stay here this afternoon?"_

_Harry shook his head. "No. I didn't leave any word for Ron or Neville as to where I was going, so I'd better head back after lunch. Besides, I've probably invaded on your studying time enough as it is."_

When Harry returned to the training complex, Hermione's words had begun repeating in his head over and over again: "_Your present and future are more than enough for me."_

_Going over to his bedside drawers, Harry opened the top drawer and pulled out a small blue velvet box. Taking a seat on his bed, he opened the box and gazed at the ring within: Lily Potter's engagement ring._

_Many would consider them too young to marry, but Hermione was his heart and soul._

_But he still had one more thing that he had to do before he could ask her to become his wife._

_A week later found Harry standing in front of his bedroom mirror, busily making himself presentable._

_Today was the day._

_And he'd be lying if he said he wasn't nervous. His palms were all sweaty and it felt as though his stomach was filled with at least dozen Snitches, all restlessly fluttering around inside of him. _

_The sound of his door being opened caught Harry's attention._

"_Hey, Harry. We're going down to the Leaky Cauldron for dinner," came Ron's voice from the hallway. "You coming?"_

"_Thanks, but I'll have to pass."_

"_Pass?" Ron repeated as he stepped into Harry's room and caught sight of his raven-haired best friend, who was fidgeting with his shirt collar._

_Ron regarded his friend silently. _

_When he'd returned six days ago, Harry had seemed to be distracted by something as he had told Ron and Neville briefly of where he'd been that morning before retreating to his room. Ron had chalked Harry's behaviour up to something that Hermione had said to him and hadn't thought any more of it. _

_But as the week had progressed, it had become clear to Ron that something was on Harry's mind. _

_He was his usual focused and determined self during training, but as soon as they were back in the dormitory, he would retreat into his room, reappear for briefly dinner, then disappear again and they wouldn't see him until breakfast the following morning. The few times that he did venture into the common room, Neville and Ron would have to repeat their questions to him several times before they would get an answer._

_Tonks had also noticed the change and she appeared at the dormitory one rainy afternoon._

"Tonks!" Ron called to the metamorphmagus as she walked past the common room door.

Tonks stopped as Ron appeared in the doorway.

"Have you been talking to Harry?"

Tonks nodded her head.

"And?"

"When your time comes, you'll understand what he's going through." Tonks said simply.

"My time?" Ron repeated, furrowing his brow for a moment, but then realisation dawned on him. "He's going to propose to Hermione, isn't he?"

"He wants to ask for her father's permission first, though." Tonks explained.

Needless to say, Ron had immediately understood his friend's behaviour.

_Harry brought Ron from his thoughts when he picked up a small velvet box from the dresser beside him and turned to face his friend._

_At once, Ron understood what was going on. "You're going to the Grangers?"_

_Harry nodded, not trusting himself to speak._

"_I'll leave you be then. Good luck," Ron said as he stepped back into the hallway._

_Harry fidgeted with his clothes on last time before he followed Ron out of the building._

_Half an hour later found Harry standing on the street in front of the Granger's house._

'Here goes nothing,_' he thought to himself as he summoned up all of his Gryffindor courage and strode across the lawn, up to the front door and __knocked on it three times._

_As fate would have it, it was Jake who answered the door. "Harry?"_

"_Good afternoon, Mr Granger."_

"_Well, I must say, this is a surprise. Come in, come in."_

_Jake stepped aside and Harry followed Hermione's father into the lounge room._

"_You must have hot ears," Jake told the young wizard. "Miranda and I were talking about you earlier today. Now, how can I help you?"_

"_I... uh..." Harry felt the Snitches in his stomach multiply. "I've come to ask for your permission to marry Hermione."_

TBC...

102


	5. Author's Notes: Helping Haiti

**Author's Note:**

To all my faithful readers,

With the recent earthquakes in Haiti, my wonderful Beta: Blueglaceon, drew my attention to a LJ community: help_haiti.

This site is holding a fanfiction auction, with writers offering pieces of their writing for sale in hopes of raising money to help the devastated island.

I have offered my services to this worthy cause:

_User Name: Knights_Honour  
Email address: nlmaxwell85 at hotmail dot com  
YM/AIM/Gtalk/ICQ (optional):  
You can see things I've created at: (http://) www (dot) fanfiction (dot) net (forward slash) u (forward slash) 729099 (forward slash) Knights-Honour_

I am offering: One piece of fanfiction of at least 5000 words of a prompt of your choosing or an untold scenario from 'Memoreis of Harmony'

Fandoms (if appropriate): Harry Potter (Harry/Hermione)

Additional Info (optional): I write romance/action/adventure. I can write smut. I don't do threesomes/moresomes

Delivery date is sometime in June

Starting Bid: $10

If you have an LJ account and wish to bid, the website is: (http://) community (dot) livejournal (dot) com (forward slash) help_haiti (foreward slash) ?view=2088531#t2088531

The current auction will close on Wednesday, January 20, 2010 at approximately noon Eastern Standard Time.

I'd really appreciate if you took a look at this, and offer your services if you wish to, and help the people of Haiti.

Thanks again,

Knights-Honour


End file.
